DE4107 Design Practice 1

Reflective commentary on progress so far

I have now completed 2 semesters of MA Ceramics at UCLAN and have mixed (but mainly positive) feelings about my progress. Looking back at the first draft of my Learning Agreement I can see that many of the objectives have been met but I feel there is much more still to learn and areas where there is room for improvement. In terms of my personal project, I consider this still to be at an experimental stage but it is my intention to move this forward during the summer and to start to consider writing and designing a draft of the proposal for my final work.

Creative collaboration

One of the major positives I take from my experience on the MA so far is the opportunity I have had to collaborative with other creative minds. I came into the course with a reasonably high level of making skill having recently completed my BA degree specialising in ceramics.  These skills were greatly enhanced during the invaluable hands-on sessions with Wendy Lawrence at the beginning of the course.  Wendy's sessions gave me a new outlook on handling ceramic materials and changed my making habits for the better. I learned to throw away many 'making rules' that were unhelpful and to look at clay with a new attitude, allowing me greater freedom of expression and opening up new opportunities for design. I now believe that it is possible to do anything I want with clay using any methods I care to employ whether these are conventional methods or not. I need to keep this attitude fresh throughout coming semesters and hope that I will continue to have chances to work with Wendy.  I have really appreciated the excellent support from Dave too - especially with regards to practical solutions and ideas development for which he is never short on suggestions!  I always come away from his tutorials feeling fired up and inspired. Whilst I've been able to have limited tutorials with Anna, I have enjoyed corresponding with her and am pleased to get her feedback on my blog and during the occasional one-to-one - again she is full of ideas and always so encouraging.

As well as the advice and support from MA staff, I've been incredibly lucky to have had the opportunity to meet up with a number of experienced practitioners outside of the University as a result of this semester's Research assignments. Again, this has been invaluable and I am indebted to them for giving up their time to help me with my project development.

The MA course has certainly changed my view point with regards to approaching other makers and for the first time I am beginning to find these kind of collaborations useful and appealing. In the past I have worked in a solitary manner quite a lot of the time, often actively avoiding working with others where I could get away with it. I believe this was mainly down to confidence in my own ability and feeling shy of sharing my work and ideas with others who I considered more experienced and professional. I am becoming less bothered by this and more open to creative collaboration.

Ideas development and research

My initial written assignment and research were a little disjointed from my practical project work. That said, I enjoyed all of the reading and exploration I carried out for the first assignment and learned a great deal about matters relating to the science of light and about the use of lighting in living and work spaces. I also discovered the work of Jean Nouvel and through reading about his designs, I further explored themes of responsive architectures. The idea of sculptural and architectural work that responds naturally - and dynamically - to light continues to interest me and to be a major theme of my project. 

In contrast to the first assignment, investigations for my recent Research Report were hugely successful and relevant in my view. The visit to SkyDome and Joseph Hillier studios especially brought clarity to some of my ideas and gave me the encouragement I needed to continue to pursue them. A visit to the sculpture park at Cheeseburn Grange gave me the chance to speak with curators of large-scale sculptural work and an opportunity to evaluate site-specificity at first hand.


Design and making

As stated earlier, my making skills have continued to improve and I have enjoyed working with new clays and pushing the boundaries a little in terms of my designs. I derive a lot of pleasure from making difficult and challenging objects out of clay.  It continues to astound me what can be made from what is effectively just refined mud! 

I am pleased with the work I made in Hungary, especially the salt-glazed mesh and pierced raku forms.

I now need to concentrate less on technical challenges and more on constructing ceramic components that are part of a more developed design concept which will fully take into consideration site and lighting.  


In summary

As I approach semester three, I feel it is important that I begin to join up my practical work with my ideas research and start to give consideration to a more cohesive and connected proposal that gives proper context to my work.  It's my belief that this will begin to come together more successfully once I have a site identified for the work. Therefore I have included this objective as a major part of my most recent Learning Agreement.