‘Formative’, an exhibition from Solihull College & University Centre students is currently running in The Core Theatre in Solihull. The exhibition takes a snapshot of the work of Higher Level Art students as they move toward their final exhibitions this year.
The exhibit captures the work of four students at important stages in their development. Formative is a unique opportunity to see work in progress; the raw materials and experimentation that goes in to the dynamic outcomes that students proudly exhibit every year. The diverse show features work by artists challenging the stigma attached to mental health, painting based work that addresses our fragmented memories, ambitious large scale drawings that reflect on the artists experiences of the overwhelming scale of urban China and powerful photographic images captured first hand during the ‘Gilets Jaunes’ riots in Paris this year. It is both exciting and compelling to view.
Darrel Field, 46, and Hannah Clare, 22 are two of the exhibiting students. Darrel travelled to Paris to shoot the ‘Gilets Jaunes’ riots. His final project will deal with photographs, sculpture and the idea of making sound visible. He intends to build his finished project around the theme of protest and the visual impact of sound from protests.
Hannah’s piece is on fragmented memories and is created using photographs of items that are combined and painted from the images, using 77 individual canvases to create one giant piece.
Also exhibiting is Megan Rolf who explores mental health through photographs and paintings and Colin Faulkner who exhibited his drawing of the Shanghai cityscape.
Hannah states; ‘our course has been an amazing grounding to get us to the point of exhibiting, we have the freedom to create our own art but know we are supported continuously with guidance from tutors and the studio space is great’.
Phil Barber, Lecturer at the college stated; ‘This is a brave exhibit as it reflects a moment in our student’s development when the pieces are a work in progress rather than a finished piece. It is more important now more than ever for people to express themselves, our students are experiencing things, processing them and displaying a reflection of how it feels to live in this era’.
The students hope that their openness and honesty in showing work-in-progress will encourage others to take the leap and start working toward a qualification that they are passionate about, proving it’s never too soon, or too late to begin learning and developing.
‘Formative’ will be on display in The Courtyard Gallery of The Core to the general public until 19th March 2019.
