Study event review: OCAEast of England

Saturday 27 July 2019

10 students met with OCA tutor Andrea Norrington for an afternoon meeting to discuss “The Influence of Curation on the Creative Arts”.

With a mix of subjects represented from painting, drawing, illustration, visual culture, graphic design and photography, and students ranging from starting to their studies at Level 1 to those on their final Level 3 unit, the afternoon consisted of wide ranging discussion.

Setting the discussion around a series of clips from the film Mona Lisa’s Smile.

The group explored a range of issues looking at how curation has developed in the creative arts, to more recent concerns about who is selecting the work we currently see.

Clip 1

Clip 2

Clip 3

For the second half of the session, students shared recent work.  This enabled the group to see a range of sketchbooks from Graphic Design, recent paintings, landscape drawings, photographs for work in progress from Level 3 and a discussion on a final project outline.

Feedback from the students after the session included:

“Many thanks to those who made it possible.  It can be quite lonely studying by Distance eLearning but these meetings keep us in touch with others in the same boat and it is interesting to feel the empathy across the group.

The discussion led by Andrea gave us opportunity to take time to think more deeply about curating – the drivers, ethics, politics and economics.  Yet again the group’s discussion was very penitent to all our journeys and definitely I shall be making use of the references! Thanks”

Veronica – Level 3 Photography Student

Thanks to all students who participating in the discussion and sharing of work and ideas.

The next meeting is practical and planned for Saturday 28 September.  An outing to the Suffolk coast focusing hopefully on Aldeburgh for a day of drawing, painting, photography or writing.  More details to follow.

Bibliography for the discussion:

Balzer, D. (2014) Curationism: How Curating Took Over the Art World and Everything Else. London. Pluto Press. 

Benjamin, W. (2008) ‘The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction’ In: Benjamin, W. One Way Street. London: Penguin. pp228-259

Mona Lisa’s Smile. (2003) Directed by Newell, M. [DVD] USA. Sony.

Phillips, C. (1993) ‘The Judgement Seat of Photography’ In: Bolton, R (ed.) The Contest of Meaning: Critical Histories in Photography. Cambridge: MIT Press. pp15-46.

Wolfe, T. (1975) The Painted Word. New York. Picador.

Further reading:

Link to the article: The Judgement Seat of Photography by Christopher Phillips

https://www.oca-student.com/resource-type/thejudgementseat

(You should be able to view this article if you log in with your OCA email address.)

Link to the article: The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction by Walter Benjamin

https://web.mit.edu/allanmc/www/benjamin.pdf