Category Archives: fine art

SWEET FA: Fine Art Degree Show 2019

University of Kent’s School of Music and Fine Art – Fine Art Degree Show, 18 – 24 May 2019.

The University of Kent’s School of Music and Fine Art presents Sweet FAthe Fine Art Degree Show 2019; an exhibition of work by 20 exciting, emerging international artists, set in the extraordinary environment of The Historic Dockyard, Chatham, Kent.

Opening with a Private View on Saturday, May 18th, 1pm – 6pm, with, at 3pm speeches from special guests; the acclaimed artist Bob & Roberta Smith, Victoria Pomery, director of the Turner Contemporary Gallery, Margate, and Karen Cox, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Kent.

The exhibition is open to all and is free to attend. It is open to the public from Sunday 19 – Friday 24 May, 10am – 5pm. Please note the show is closed on Tuesday 21 May.

Continuing a tradition of showcasing bold, exploratory exhibitions by the University of Kent’s Fine Art students, visitors will encounter a broad range of artistic styles and media, an explosion of imagination and a celebration of art’s potential for society, framed by the backdrop of the Historic Dockyard Chatham. The exhibition will offer the public a fascinating insight into contemporary art’s most recent practices and processes.

The catalogue for this year’s show is designed in collaboration with MA Curation students from the University of Kent’s School of Arts

 

The Degree Show Address:
The Historic Dockyard, Chatham, Kent, ME4 4TY
Entry for the private view is via The Galvanising Shop (next to the Dockyard’s visitors’ car park on the East Road, and for the rest of the exhibition, via The Historic Dockyard Chatham Visitor Entrance). http://thedockyard.co.uk/plan-your-visit/opening-times-directions/
SMFA Twitter: @unikentmfa
SMFA Website: http://www.kent.ac.uk/smfa
Fine Art Student Instagramhttps://www.instagram.com/fine.art.finale/?hl=en

 

Contact Details:
For further press information and images of the works on display please contact School Reception:
MFAReception@kent.ac.uk   or telephone 01634 888 980

The University of Kent is closing the School of Music and Fine Art and it will cease to exist after July 2019.  Sweet FA… is, therefore, its last Fine Art degree show!

WICKED – Women in creative event design. Event & Experience Design Showcase.

 

Saturday 18th May to Friday 24th May
Studio 1, Engineering Workshop, Chatham Historic Dockyard ME4 4TZ
Saturday 18.05.19 13.00 – 18.00
Sunday to Friday 19.05.19 – 24.05.19, 10.00 – 17.00
Tuesday 21.05.19 – Closed

The Showcase, WICKED, celebrates the work of current Event and Experience Design graduating students. As this is a special celebration of the undergraduate course we will be celebrating the achievements of our alumni from the very start of the course. Thirteen years of ambition, aspiration, achievement and excellence within education and the events industry

Like their predecessors, these early career designers have continued to make work at the forefront of contemporary practice in the ever-expanding field of events.  They have embraced changes in technology, taken delight in manipulating and crafting materials and always prioritised the creation of a memorable experience for their audiences.

SMFA Fine Art Interim Show

Private View
Friday 7th December
5-7pm
The Gallery, Sun Pier House, Chatham

Public Opening Times
Saturday 8th – Tuesday 11th December
Tuesday to Saturday 10am – 4pm
Sunday 12pm – 4pm
The Gallery, Sun Pier House, Chatham

The School of Music and Fine Art’s final BA Fine Art Interim Show will open on Friday 7th December at Sun Pier House, Chatham. The show will be open to the public from Saturday 8th –Tuesday 11th December. Last year’s show, held in the historic Chatham House, attracted over 300 visitors on the opening night. This is an event not to be missed!

On occasion the opening times may vary depending on the events schedule. Please contact Sun Pier House before travelling to confirm the Gallery will be open for your visit, on 01634 401 549. There is restricted disabled access at the venue, please contact Sun Pier House for further information.

EED Site Responsive Event

Artwork by Krunal Taylor. Photo by Stacey Cooper, 2018.

 

Thursday 6th December
1-3pm
The Guardhouse, Fort Amherst, Chatham

Event and Experience Design students have been investigating a site-specific installation this term. The site for their practice based projects is the Guardhouse at Fort Amherst. This is a restored building at the border of the currently accessible public part of the Fort and the unrestored area – an exciting liminal space to explore!

Artwork by Charlotte Harding. Photo by Chien Yi Yang, 2018.

 

The students will present a series of individual responses to the Guardhouse and its context within a listed monument on the afternoon of Thursday 6thDecember.

Wrap up and wear sturdy footwear and please wait at the café by the Fort Amherst visitor carpark. This event is FREE to attend but please book via Eventbrite.

SMFA Visiting Artist Talk – Sarah Pickstone

Tuesday 20th November
5 – 7pm
Clock Tower Lecture Theatre, Historic Dockyard Chatham

Sarah Pickstone is a painter who lives and works in London. She makes very large-scale paintings in watercolour with oil and draws extensively. Sarah has a particular interest in the contribution made by women artists and writers to visual and literary history and their creative processes.

In 2012, she won the John Moores Painting Prize and was a runner up for the prize in 2004. She exhibits internationally most recently in Shanghai, Seoul, Basel and Italy. She was recently commissioned by the Royal Academy of Arts as part of RA250 to create a homage to the work of the 18th century female artist, Angelica Kauffman. The resulting two-part painting installation titled An Allegory of Painting, is currently in the Burlington house Hallway and Ramp Space, Royal Academy of Arts, Piccadilly London until August, 2019.

These events are FREE to attend and open to all. Book online at Eventbrite.

SMFA Visiting Artist Talk – David Cross

‘Tristesse’ David Cross, 2010.

 

Tuesday 13th November
5 – 7pm
Clock Tower Lecture Theatre, Historic Dockyard Chatham

“Art is what fills the gap between how the world is and how I’d love it to be.” – David Cross

David Cross will be speaking about critical engagement and context-specificity both in his individual work, and that of Cornford & Cross.

As a contemporary fine artist with Cornford & Cross, David produced sculptural installations that engage with issues at the intersection of visual culture, resource scarcity and conflict.

As a postgraduate educationalist, he encourages an interdisciplinary, research-oriented and socially engaged approach to the design profession.

Through participating in and facilitating public debate, he aims to stimulate critical engagement with the separation of cultural activity and everyday life.

These events are FREE to attend and open to all. Book online at Eventbrite.

Pay Gaps and Thigh Gaps: SMFA graduating Fine Art students exhibit in London

‘Pay Gaps and Thigh Gaps’ art exhibition: Rachael Willis, Ayesha Chouglay, Deborah Abbott, Amanda Nsubuga, Angel Obi and Alexandra Aldham (left to right)

 

Between 6th – 10th July, Pay Gaps and Thigh Gaps, an exhibition by a group of graduating SMFA Fine Art students was on at Old Truman’s Brewery in Brick Lane, London, as part of Free Range – A season of Graduate Art & Design Exhibitions.

Established in 2001 to showcase the work of emerging creatives, thousands of students have exhibited at the shows, taking over Old Truman Brewery spaces each summer and connecting with a London audience. It aims to celebrate talent and provide a platform for UK artists beyond education. The show was extremely successful, with an amazing turn out.

SMFA Students featured were:

BA (Hon) Fine Art
Amanda Nsubuga, Alexandra Aldham, Ayesha Chouglay, Angel Obi and Rachael Willis

MA Fine Art
Deborah Abbott

 

About Pay Gaps and Thigh Gaps
There seems to be a growing precedent that in order to be recognised as a female artist you must limit your practice to being ‘feminist’. But why can’t a woman speak beyond her gender to gain recognition? We are a group of proud feminists who would like to share varying concerns beyond our genitalia (and possibly surrounding our genitalia- we would like the option). From, childhood imagination, to personal illness, we come together with uniquely different practices, to support each other as artists… who happen to be female.

 

More at http://www.free-range.org.uk/cgi-bin/exhibition.pl?yearID=27&exhibitionID=1443  and Instagram at pay_gapsandthigh_gaps

Work by SMFA Fine Art alumna Nadia Perrotta selected by UNESCO for Human Rights Contemporary Art Exhibition

 

A moving image installation about art and children called Because I am, written and directed by SMFA alumni Nadia Perrotta (BA, 2015, and MA Fine Art, 2017) and featuring Lalita Bailey, (BA Fine Art 2017) and the children of Squirrel Lodge and The Rabbit on the Moon nurseries, has been selected for a major UNESCO event in Italy about art and education.

Presented by Associazione Internazionale Arti Plastiche Italia, Spazio-Tempo Arte and Fondazione Opera Campana dei Caduti, Human Rights? #EDU 2018 is an International Exhibition of Contemporary Art from 23 June – 23 September at the Fondazione Opera Campana dei Caduti, Rovereto, Trento, Italy which features 161 artists from 37 countries defending the human right to education.

The event asks the artists to represent and tell, with their own artistic language, a personal vision of the problem of the right to education representing a story, a concept, a complaint, or showing a future perspective as message of hope or as a concrete proposal on the opportunities to be pursued to achieve this fundamental goal for the construction of a fair and right society.

More about the event here: http://aiapi.it/hr-edu-en

Nadia’s film Because I Am was created during her artist residency since September 2016, at The Rabbit on The Moon Nursery in Sittingbourne, and there will be an exhibition – Because I am: A children’s journey across self recognition and discovery of the world around them through the arts  – on Saturday 23rd June, 12-3pm at Kemsley Community Centre, The Square, Ridham Ave, Kemsley, Sittingbourne showing the works the children created with her throughout the past year.

See Nadia’s film here: https://youtu.be/L7y0d5U20oM

Nadia is a film maker and visual artist with experience in exhibiting and organizing events, art writing and curating.  She works mostly with time based, installations, digital work, creative writing and performances. An experienced curator and art director, she was Project Leader for Wetlands Medway.  More info about Nadia here https://nadiaperrotta.jimdo.com/

 

Related posts: https://www.kent.ac.uk/smfa/news.html?view=2856 and https://www.kent.ac.uk/smfa/news.html?view=2859

SMFA Fine Art alumni create art intervention for Whitstable Biennale

 

SMFA alumni Nadia Perrotta (BA Fine Art, 2015, and MA Fine Art, 2017) and Fiona Townend  (MA Fine Art, 2017) together created an art intervention involving photography and creative writing for Whitstable Biennale. The project, called Cuttlefish Bones, ran from 2-10 June, and was an artistic and poetic treasure trail winding through the streets of Whitstable suitable for adults and children alike, a fusion of poetic text, domestic mini tales and photographs of the unnoticed.

More info http://satellite.whitstablebiennale.com/project/cuttlefish-bones-a-treasure-trail/

 

About the artists:
www.fionatownend.com
nadiaperrotta.jimdo.com

SMFA Fine Art Alumna Nadia Perrotta Artist in Residence Exhibition in Kent

 

Since September 2016, SMFA alumna Nadia Perrotta (BA, 2015,  and MA Fine Art, 2017) has been artist in residence at The Rabbit on The Moon Nursery in Sittingbourne, and there will be an exhibition showing the works the children created with her throughout the past year.

Because I am: A children’s journey across self recognition and discovery of the world around them through the arts takes place on Saturday 23rd June, 12-3pm at Kemsley Community Centre, The Square, Ridham Ave, Kemsley, Sittingbourne.

Nadia is a film maker, visual artist, art writer and event organiser who works mostly with time based, installations, digital work, creative writing and performances. An experienced curator and art director, she was Project Leader for Wetlands Medway.

More info about Nadia here: https://uk.linkedin.com/in/nadia-perrotta-082a537