fullonvirtualheartsurgery

Work wise it's been a full on week, the process of planning permission is underway at Chelmsford so should hopefully, maybe start making work soonish.  Assessment time at NUA  is an immersive exercise and takes all sorts of energy but it's exciting to spend quality time with the work submitted. Tutorials with OCA students has been wonderfully creative. They are taking on the huge task of challenging their working patterns to create new work within a new context, testing boundaries. For my part I have been made aware of a huge range of new work and ideas alongside providing advice and support. Synthetic anatomy has seen me attempting to take on board learning 3D medical imaging software. It's a steep curve but awesome - working on the heart virtually is fairly mind blowing - can't wait to try and 3D print my efforts. The end of the f***ing world is a great road movie coming of age season - watched it all, 8 episodes in one go - yea that compelling http://www.imdb.com/title/tt6257970/ Gilbert and George at White Cube - what to say - I loved the sign warning of bad language outside, although fucking became so oblivious that it ceased to actually have the impact it can have in isolation. Its Condo in London time http://www.condocomplex.org/london/ so decided to check out a few spaces in the east end - loved the nipping from space to space festival vibe

youtoocanbecreative

A week of painting ceilings at the building site that is my house was underpinned with seminars and a lecture at NUA – in an attempt to connect what I do as a maker with what I do as an educator I gave a presentation about the recent robotics project using some of the teaching tools I use with the students. This attempt to match what we ask of the students with what I do hopefully explained why we advise them to undertake certain activities – education is good for you! If you turn up! See it on slideshare http://www.slideshare.net/l.bicknell/soft-robotics-with-kings-and-craft-council-45978442 although you will need a link to Aidans soundcloud and then play his tracks under the films within the PowerPoint – yes it was a little DIY messy. But then that was the point....you too can do this. https://soundcloud.com/aidan-johnson

drawinglanscapes

A busy week so far – 2 days in N Norfolk staying in a holiday camp with year 1 textile students – a time to get together .......drawing outside and bonding. There are some really extraordinary landscapes to work out on the coast - its a great experience which stays with the students and they build with on throughout their practice within the years to come.

danceteachdeconstruction

Finally got round to see skyfall - a good bond movie esp enjoyed the nod to the Bourne trilogy - only marred by the person next to me pointing out that he had been to all the locations and how he had enjoyed them - i did see it in the rather posh venue of Aldeburgh cinema.    

The Shechter Dance Company was at Snape - most excellent - Uprising was a full on assault from the first second - men emerge from the shadows and go through maleness in all its madness and glory - lighting and music never gave you a moment of rest p wonderful - although a little limited in its palette (maybe that was the point) if they are near you go see. http://www.hofesh.co.uk/

Teaching at nuca has been a mixture of deconstructing learning and teaching with cake on the BA! a workshop around the digital www.slideshare.net/l.bicknell/course-seminar-4-digital and one about the multiple on the MA – looking forward to seeing the results of a set project next week.

Managed two days of pleating and folding http://unpickingandrebinding.blogspot.co.uk/ the sacks are from MEAL.

alloutteaching

A long week – mainly teaching at nuca – two days with year 1 BA textile students away at a holiday camp in Hunstanton, drawing, walking, mind expanding, developing strategies for learning and generally bonding. http://www.slideshare.net/l.bicknell/presentation1-14790722 http://www.slideshare.net/l.bicknell/briefing-for-hunstanton-wednesday next day course committee meeting and then another of seminars with post graduate students on the two MA units – first – defining practice and then discussing ways to talk and write about work. http://www.slideshare.net/l.bicknell/course-seminar-2-reading-fashion-and-textiles looking forward to tomorrow and chance to get some folding and smocking under way.

walkingandtalking

building a long walk from several short ones for an excellent day out on Sunday – the landscape around orford on the suffolk coast is really other - constantly shifting with sky becoming land becoming sea.

meanwhile tutorials at nuca with year 3 textiles reveal a range of exciting possibilities and the two presentations i'm giving on thursday will look at researching and developing a practice. http://www.slideshare.net/l.bicknell/researching-the-world
http://www.slideshare.net/l.bicknell/course-seminar-1-defining-practice

2020=400researchisall

Pecha Kucha – i am designated the Course Unit Tutor on the post graduate RiPU (research into practice unit) for the MA Textile Design Course at Norwich University College of the Arts - so - new students to meet and work with and an opportunity to show research through a Pecha Kucha.

http://www.slideshare.net/l.bicknell/pecka-cucha-for-post-grad-at-nuca

theendisnigh

1 day down – 1094 to go for the new cohort of textile design students at nuca - a good day with lots of input and information for them to take in mixed up with interaction with each other.  and the construction of the letter that they write to themselves to be given to them 3 years from now just as they start to put together their work for the final show -  its a moment to consider why you are on the course, what you want and to construct your own version of success.

working on a Pecha Kucha presentation for the Research into Practice Unit on the Post Graduate at nuca has thrown up some images from Malta – working with string to create mass and images within a space – must add this image to talk about materials and their inherent qualities.

the show at Imago Gallery is now down – a nice link to CAMAC blog site - http://londondesignfestival.tumblr.com/post/31788106469/camac-design

creativeassessing

Thinking about the cycles in the work I am engaged in over the year - well it’s that time of year so I am deep in the middle of assessing final year work at nuca. there are some interesting starting points within the portfolios so I am looking forward to seeing what students make for the final show.

Meanwhile i am engaged with the part of my practice that is more focused around working with people.

I have been working with the Peer Assisted Learning (PALS) coordinator at nuca on the induction day for new volunteers. Lots of group bonding sessions and sharing skills workshops. 

I am also working with Artlink on a very special project called Creative Carers where I am developing workshops with /for the carers of elderly people in care homes. It will be an interesting and stretching project which will I am looking forward to – the first session was excellent – part of this was the training - thinking about my role and skills as a communicator and the other was that i was able to cycle to work! 

everydaydissent

the Jeremy Deller show at the hayward was for me pointedly depressing, resurrecting the twin 70s icons of oppression and violence. this was most prevalent in the work about the miner turned glam wrestler, Adrian Street, recollections of the boredom of Saturday afternoons came flooding back through the grainy film. the show is quite possibly one of the most important exhibitions so far this year, hopefully promoting a model of dissent and a challenge to the conformity of todays everyday.
possibly the vehicle for this challenge might be at the ica which celebrates the exuberance of dissident voices – often with the use of cheap printing or the office photocopier in the show in numbers – serial publications by artists since 1955 http://www.ica.org.uk/exhibitions or the alternative could be to lounge in the gloriously banal animations of David Shrigley, particularly the headless drummer, the queue, yes a queue to see art, was a challenge – whilst waiting i remembered a time when going to an art gallery was a minority experience, its always a challenge when the alternative is subsumed into the mainstream.
if anybody needed to see a way of doing this ‘challenging the norm thing’ they could look to Lis Rhodes who is also at the ica – she has been making radical and experimental films since the 1970s. i can remember doing some design work called hang on a minute on a new thing called a photocopier - for circles – a women’s film distribution organisation – which had some of her work in it.
meanwhile the drawing studio at nuca has been the site of experimentation and challenge – working with year 3 students on the last opportunity to really explore the possibility of otherness within their work before the push to deliver final product for the final shows.

deaddownatsnape

nuca has been a week of admin and meetings alongside organising and researching various powerpoint presentations for upcoming ba and ma sessions.
http://www.slideshare.net/l.bicknell/017-catalogue-conversations
http://www.slideshare.net/l.bicknell/from-idea-to-outcome-feb-23
http://www.slideshare.net/l.bicknell/014-finishedness-feb-23
http://www.slideshare.net/l.bicknell/013-professional-practice-statements-for-march-19th-moved-to-feb-23
http://www.slideshare.net/l.bicknell/011-professional-practice-placements-feb-23
http://www.slideshare.net/l.bicknell/audience-feb-23
swandown at snape was a wonderful example of how not to present an idea with both Kötting and Sinclair telling us what to think about their work in an incompetent boorish fashion – truly a ‘boys club’ moment. it prompted me to think another pilgrimage more majestically documented through film which encompassed all Sinclair suggested his own trip encompassed but didn’t – that of Aldeburgh films http://www.aldeburghfilms.com/ film of Laurence Edwards http://www.laurenceedwardssculpture.com/ 3 large sculptures where transported on water from butley creak to snape maltings
the theme of death has been continuous throughout the week with a road kill dear providing Sunday lunch as well as anatomy lesson while taking it apart. The bird came from a walk on Saturday through the reed beds at walberswick.

managementreflectivetheorypractice

its been a busy week so far – a faster than sound at snape – not a bad one, it was interesting to see the wonderful Cynthia Millar and her Ondes Martenot again, although the visual side felt a little unconsidered and repetitive in the first half but it did improve in the second half with some almost exciting channel distortion from Rod Maclachlan. teaching at nuca has been around notions of ambition using images from Venice, exploring how management theory can be used in artistic reflective practice with a P.E.S.T analysis and practical advice on how to develop a context for your making.
the first teaching session at Camberwell saw 25 years of bookmaking – sequence, order, control, revelation, image generation, text, translation, narrative, 35 book structures and 225 images of bookness crammed into 4 hours of contact time. it was good afterwards to go to the private view of overdue an exciting exhibition in the library of the year 2 part-time students work and a chance to meet socially the new students. http://margaret-cooter.blogspot.com/2011/10/overdue-exhibition.html
looking forward to TED x on Saturday – highlights should be Modified Toy Orchestra who are really extraordinary and blew me away the last time i saw them and it should be great to hear Nitin Sawhney talk after seeing his many collaborations at snape, especially with Akram Kharn.

lateralcaravanthinking

just back from Hopton Holiday Village after 3 days of a residential course with year 1 textile students from nuca – a wonderful creative experience of drawing workshops, bonding exercises, lateral thinking and problem solving all within a holiday complex. It will stay with them forever!

http://www.slideshare.net/l.bicknell/hopton-2011

talkingaboutthinkingaboutwritingaboutworkthathasyettohappen

at home thinking about Daniel and the journey to the podium – an image of him stretching and one about repetition – these ideas seem really important - could they become part of the bookwork.
a full day at nuca – arriving at 8.30 to go through all the year 3 portfolios, talking out work to put in an area of the retail space we are building in the gallery space as one part of the two spaces for the final show –we are having a floor to ceiling salon hang in one part of the space - there really is some wonderful work in the portfolios, this is often unrecognised by the students as they go onto develop a lot of the raw ideas into final pieces – then sitting in on the CAB where the final year awards are read out – I like the formality of the experience and something about the reading out of the name and their mark, even though they are not there, the announcement seems enough – the saying makes it real. the afternoon was spent with the MA textile design students talking about the idea of proposals and learning agreements – talking about thinking about writing about work that has yet to happen. http://www.slideshare.net/l.bicknell/learning-agreements-considering-and-formulating managed to leave at 6.00 after checking on the wood that had arrived to build the space for new designers – come and find us at stand T43 - again - the students have work hard and the work will be stunning.

professionalcontexts

a most excellent teaching day at NUCA - starting with a professional practice session with year 2 textiles students. http://www.slideshare.net/l.bicknell/10-professional-practice-21-march-2011 this was really to begin to talk about the many ways to approach writing about your own work – starting with the idea of the question and thinking about the idea of context. it led onto discussing the 5,000 word report and how to embed it within your overall practice. the afternoon was spent with students who have entered the wallpaper competition – some superb ideas – they just need executing - finally an image to add to my picture file titled wonderful town planning and why the world is like it is