The following is written by second year student Kate Green;
Seven year two photography students are taking the last steps in organising their trip to Santander. Following the success of the #Picbod13 Exhibition at Fargo in Coventry, two remote students on the course have been working collaboratively with the students organising another exhibition overseas.
- Picbod Exhibition, Fargo Coventry, March 2013
The open #picbod course, led by Lecturer Matt Johnston, was a hit, engaging audiences online from all over the world. Charo Ruiz Davila and Ana Martin are two remote students from Santander who both took part in the weekly tasks and were valuable for online feedback as well as supporting the exhibition in Coventry. Their encouragement did not stop at the end of the ten week course, but continued with their enthusiasm to hold an exhibition in Spain.
“Though the internet course is engaging, the personal contact, a face to face relationship is undoubtedly a better way to share the passion and enjoyment of something as creative and enticing as photography” – Charo Davila
“It is a chance to let people from Santander to know about #picbod. An opportunity to celebrate a gathering where students, amateur and professional photographers could exchange knowledge, watch and learn from other people work, and of course have fun taking pictures.” – Charo Davila
Thanks to our friends at the Royal Photographic Society who are kindly offering two CU Photography students the opportunity to attend a Mishka Henner Masterclass in Birmingham from the 3-4th June.
Details of the event can be found below and a report from our students who attend will be online after the masterclass.
Mishka Henner, shortlisted for this year’s prestigious Deutsche Börse Photography Prize, will be giving a two-day masterclass in Birmingham from 3 – 4 June 2013.
Known for his provocative works that re-purpose material found through the Internet, satellite imagery and the history of photography, Mishka will explore different approaches to image hacking, introduce ways of working with online datasets and mapping tools, and discuss the contemporary uses of satellite imagery and drones.
This event forms part of a photography research project led by Karen Newman and is presented in collaboration with the Library of Birmingham’s GRAIN: Photography Hub Network and Birmingham City University.
Thanks to our friends at Adobe for these lovely leather bound notebooks which will be making their way to some of our students bags this week.
Notebook Image by Holly Constantine and Lucy Bartlett who are year 1 students currently undertaking the ‘Working with Light’ module which introduces them for the first time to studio lighting.
All of our computers in the Photography lab are running the latest Adobe creative suite 6
Dr Strangepub or: How I learned to stop worrying and love the possibilities of 21st century publishing
Recently, CU Photography’s Matt Johnston sat down to chat with 4 individuals, all with their own different take on 21st century photographic publishing, it’s possibilities and perhaps a pitfall or two as well. These conversations were recorded and are now available to list/watch via the wee website linked here.
These chats are not an attempt to classify modern photographic publishing or even to generate answers but instead to pose questions on the current state and value of photographic publishing from the live experience and handmade book to multi-platform outputs and print on demand technology.
‘Dr Strangepub’ is an online publication of conversations between Matt Johnston and a selection of 21st century photography publishers, each with their own thoughts on what publishing can offer us today and whether or not we are currently exploiting it.
These conversations are not just based on the future of digital publishing but also the roll of the physical object in the digital age and how the breakdown of traditional gatekeepers has liberated our options as content producers. This project is a collaboration between Matt Johnston, The Photobook Club and Coventry University School of Art and Design.
Goodbye and Good Luck to International Exchange Students Briita and Hanna from Finland, who have been working with our year 1 photography students this term on our Creative Digital Practice module.
“My view of photography changed, I realize there is so much more than point and click, their are many other aspects to consider” Hanna
Produced by Level 2 student and recent ‘Picbodder’ – Joseph Kesisoglou has put together this timelapse of the set-up, opening night, open day, and pack-down of the #Picbod13 Exhibition at Fargo Village in Coventry. Well done to all the students for a fantastic show, activity is continuing on the #picbod community, so keep an eye on the latest there.
Friday night saw the opening of the #picbod13 exhibition at Fargo village in Coventry. The exhibition is the culmination of 10 weeks hard work by students studying on the open class ‘Picturing the Body‘ and was put on without staff involvement.
Over 200 people turned up to opening night and pretty soon you will be able to see a record of the entire night via a time lapse the students produced. In the meantime here are several images of the opening taken by Chris Trafford as well as an exclusive Pho Bus interview with three #picbod students….
Level 1 photography student’s trip to London, tied in with our module Creative Digital Practice. We visited the Photographer’s gallery as a group and were particularly interested in Jon Rafman’s dialogue with perspectives on Collage Brand new Paint Job.
Jon Rafman
Some of the group went to see the posthumous retrospective of the Czech born artist/photographer Bella Kolarova at Raven Row gallery, a former silk merchant’s premises, in the heart of the east end. Kolarova’s experimented extensively with photographic practice during the 50’s and 60’s around themes of domesticity.
With a week to go, the level 2 students currently on Picturing the Body are preparing their final work and planning for the approaching exhibition.
Hollie on Curating duty.
Sophie editing and sequencing her project.
Kate producing her handmade book.
Melissa designing the #picbod poster.
For the first half of the module the students were set a series of weekly tasks encouraging alternative ways to (re)present and photograph the body, we collated these on our magnetic wall.
The Picbod Wall
They have since then been focussing on their main assignment, which will come together to form the Picbod 2013 exhibition, which will be opening on Friday 8th March at 6pm, at Fargo in Coventry. More details can be found on the facebook event page here.
An opportunity for 5 second year students to photograph at the recent London Fashion Weekend was quickly taken up and was a real success. One of the students, Jenny Swerdlow commented:
“…it was amazing! When we arrived we were given loads of tips and tricks and told what to expect when we got in the pit. We photographed a spring/summer catwalk show designed by Hilary Alexander, and then we got a break and a chance to shoot again, moving positions and were able to correct our mistakes and have another go. It was such a fantastic learning experience.”
“On Friday 22nd February I had an amazing opportunity, I was one of the student photographers to photograph at London Fashion weekend 2013, which was held at Somerset house. I had a very exciting and enjoyable day photographing two catwalks which presented Hilary Alexander’s spring/summer collection. There were four trends; Graphic Art, Dolls House, Eastern Promise and Urban lifestyle. The experience was really beneficial and something that I would love to do again”
