Perspectives on creative arts in higher education
Suf St James creates artworks completely within the social media app, “Snapchat” to challenge how women are subjected to abuse online. “This is the work people seem most interested in,” Suf said.
Victorian College of the Arts at the University of Melbourne is moving into a new generation of Actor’s Training. We have taken the current Theatre Practice degree and divided it into a BFA in Acting and a BFA in Theatre. With the competitive nature of the entertainment industry, we feel it is our obligation to equip our students with the mastery of skills applicable to contemporary theatre and film.
In our current climate of Higher Education funding cuts, academics are dealing with many tasks and additional administration as part of their job. As the pressures on academics mount, part-time and casual positions in academia have become the rule rather than the exception
Jessica Schwientek is known by her fellow artists as a “dirty photographer”. “I was always getting told off by how dirty and filthy my negatives were,” Jessica said. “I didn’t realize at the time that my lecturer did a similar thing . . .”
After completing and thoroughly enjoying my Honours research project I was inspired to pursue a career as an academic. Having now been awarded a Master of Arts in music performance (100% research) and after picking up small amounts of casual academic employment, I’d like to share my experiences so far to hopefully shed some light on the process for those considering post-graduate research.
Catherine Holder, past student, author and performer, is sitting at the share table at Corner Café, a popular lunch spot at the Burwood campus of Deakin University.
She graduated with Honours from her Bachelor of Creative Arts, Drama, in April this year and is here to catch up with members of the Arts Faculty and to borrow some props for her show at The Owl and Cat Theatre, Richmond
I teach into the field of studio-based craft and design (SBCD). When it comes to teaching SBCD there are some particular challenges.
“I think going to university was definitely the right choice for me,” said visual artist and Deakin University final-year student Alice Radford. “If I wasn’t at university I wouldn’t have bothered to do the research, or have the resources to do the research, to create the works that I have,” Alice said. “I think I would be just creating art on a Sunday just for fun.”
In 2018, the theatre department at the Victorian College of the Arts will launch a new BFA Theatre - a course designed for ‘actor-creators’ – those theatre artists who want to devise and perform in their own work. As we developed the course this year, I found myself thinking often of a quote from Saint-Exupery’s Wisdom of the Sands:
“If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up the people to gather wood, divide the work and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea.”