The Camberwell BA Illustration class of 2016 of which I am a proud member has just had their interim or “work in progress” exhibition.
It’s really exciting to see the work my classmates are making. What I found people at the exhibition commented on most was the range of different media used by the young illustrators. I think this is due to our course’s loose definition of the term “illustration”. From day one on the course, we have been actively encouraged to step away from cliches of what the subject is and have pushed out of our comfort zones. Workshops during our time on the course have included costume making, three dimensional set building and performance. This process of constant experimenting was obvious in our exhibition as the students presented board games; interactive pieces; sculptures; notice boards; films; costumes; a scroll; tents; ceramics; books; sewn and embroidered pieces; paintings; a weaving; performance; printmaking and small sets.
I could spend this article going through every one of my classmates’ work with an equal level of excitement because, as cheesy as it sounds, I am so proud of how far we’ve come! However, I’m not going to do that as there are around seventy of us and I’m not planning on making this article my second dissertation.
Instead, I would like to tell you about the exciting and stressful job we have given ourselves, on top of our already overwhelming final year, which is to organise an external exhibition in July which will be in addition to our internal exhibition in June. This has become a tradition for graduates of the Camberwell BA Illustration course, previous external exhibitions have been OVO in 2011; Mixed Special in 2012; Well Said in 2013; In Place in 2014; and Rock Paper Scissors in 2015. We will be calling our exhibition Look Here.
For this exhibition to happen though, we are frantically trying to fundraise enough money in many ways, mainly so that we will be able to book a space and produce a professional catalogue that showcases all of our work as well as all other expenses that come with organising an exhibition as large as this.
One way we have been fundraising is by holding bi-monthly fairs at the Peckham Pelican, a lovely cafe a short walk from our college that has been kind enough to let us use their space. We call these fairs Signed and Numbered and they have given us a great opportunity to showcase our work in a commercial way. Our next one will be on the 20th of February. We are upping our game with this because as well as our usual sale of prints, drawings, zines, ceramics, cards, postcards, t-shirts, books and more we are also going to be running workshops so we can share the skills we have learnt on our course with the public. I will be running a workshop on stamp making. There will also be live portrait drawing. I am hoping it will be a successful day.
Another way we are fundraising is through a Kickstarter and with less than a month to go time is running out to receive donations. If there are any readers out there feeling generous the link is https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1573959405/look-here-camberwell-illustration-2016?ref=video
The class will also be holding events such as club nights; a postcard sale and will be making appearances at further illustration fairs. If you would like to keep up with us on social media here are our links:
https://www.facebook.com/LookHereIllustration/?fref=ts
https://www.instagram.com/lookhere2016/
https://twitter.com/lookhere2016
Words:Florence Goodhand-Tait Photo:Arthur de Carvalho Wandeur © Artlyst 2016