News - Shape of Things to Come
University College Falmouth press release
Over thirty second-year students on University College Falmouth's BA(Hons) Contemporary Crafts course are busy putting the final touches to their exhibits ready for The Shape of Things to Come exhibition at the Poly from Friday 20 February to Thursday 26 February.
The innovative exhibition features innovative work using glass, clay, wood, metal, recycled materials and found objects created by students since the beginning of the academic year, allowing their imaginations free reign and seeing objects and shapes in a new light.
The students work with singular or combined materials, producing one-off artefacts that are both decorative and functional. The vibrancy of the show reflects the unique educational environment that the College's world-class Design Centre offers.
The word 'crafts' often brings to mind a traditional way of making but this exhibition is anything but traditional as BA(Hons) Contemporary Crafts Course Leader, Jason Cleverly explains:
"This is a critical stage for students on the Contemporary Crafts course. They will be presenting self negotiated work for the first time and having to consider how that work is displayed, lighting and arranging their work not just as single pieces, but also as part of a whole exhibition." He continued, "The created objects should really begin to reveal the nature of each individual's approach, the way they respond to particular materials and understand the possibilities for themselves and their audience."
The BA(Hons) Contemporary Crafts course at University College Falmouth encourages students to be experimental, to explore new ways of using traditional craft making methods and to find their own artistic voice whilst redefining what craft in the 21st century means. Two of the rising stars of tomorrow are graduates Jeremy Doar and Remon Jephcot. Jeremy has just been announced as the winner of the Warm Glass 2008 Newcomers Prize for his Amber Cross, building on his success earlier in the year when he was selected for the Corning Glass Museum New Glass Review. Remon has been awarded the Society of Designer Craftsmen TSB Award for Excellence and will be exhibiting at the Newlyn Art Gallery in April this year.
For further information about BA(Hons) Contemporary Crafts at University College Falmouth, please visit http://www.falmouth.ac.uk/crafts, email admissions@falmouth.ac.uk or contact Admissions on 01326 214356 (for the full-time option) or 01326 214357 (for the part-time route).
University College Falmouth is the only independent Higher Education institution in Cornwall with the powers to award degrees in its own name. It has two campuses in Cornwall - at Woodlane in Falmouth and Tremough in Penryn (which it owns, and jointly manages with the University of Exeter) - and a third campus at Totnes in Devon, following its merger with Dartington College of Arts in 2008.
This merger created a new institution focusing on the expansion of Falmouth's expertise in Art, Design and Media and Dartington's expertise in Choreography, Music, Theatre, Art and Writing. The Devon-based courses will relocate to a new, high-specification Performance Centre at Tremough in 2010, paving the way for a new specialist Arts University in Cornwall by 2012, that will be unique to the South West.
The College is a founding partner in the Combined Universities in Cornwall (CUC), a unique initiative to promote regional economic regeneration through Higher Education, funded mainly by the European Union, the South West Regional Development Agency, and the Higher Education Funding Council for England, with support from Cornwall County Council.