A review of Chelsea BA Fine Art 2011 Degree Show, by Jenny Evans
(Also published by a-n, Degrees Unedited)
Last week, Stephen Farthing said ‘art school can’t make anyone a good artist. A good artist happens to you.’ Art school can help, of course. But something is required of the individual.
The degree show at Chelsea College of Art and Design comprises a daunting number of individuals. Each has been released, it seems, to pursue their cultural and artistic territory of choice. They are in conversation with each other, but cultivating thoroughly individual interests. Not only this, but a healthy proportion of them seem to be grappling with, or referencing, issues of importance from outside of the art-institutional bubble. An apt illustration of all this must be Tim Ridley’s performance, Car Trouble, Oh Yeah! Equipped with a toy tractor and an abundance of squeaky rubber animals, he positions himself as both observant oracle and blind regurgitator of instances of high and low-end culture, between which we so often differentiate.
This year-group is the third to graduate since the removal of ‘pathways’ on the BA Fine Art course. Painting, Sculpture and the amusingly ambiguous Media no longer inhibit the artists’ movements. The vast majority of the students display a healthy awareness of the critical implications of these traditions. However there is a determinedly holistic feel to their working. There were some particularly enjoyable incidents of interaction between sculptural form and time-based media, such as Anna Moderato’s installation of wooden constructions and films of moving limbs, and Laura Marley’s intricately devised selection of curious art objects.
Working with a large and complicated building, the fine art course leaders have made some very acute judgements about what goes where. Equal recognition should go to them and the students for the tangible and lively relationships that sparked between the various bodies of work. It was also enjoyable to observe the number of students who engaged thoughtfully with their allocated spaces, whether or not this relationship was a core element of their practice. Joe Crowdy and Keira Greene’s installations both benefited not merely from a sensitivity towards architectural features, but a very calculated plotting of the viewers’ movements and sense of place.
At this stage, it seems a difficult thing to recognise who is a ‘good artist’. The intense atmosphere in art colleges around the time of the degree show reflects the huge sense of importance placed on this moment in time as an opportunity to be ‘spotted’ or acknowledged. One feels it might be unhelpful to nurture this sort of expectation so early on in artist’s career. Yet degree shows provide a unique challenge to the artist, to produce a resolved body of work, and to test themselves in front of the viewing public. So it is with the Fine Art students at Chelsea College of Art and Design – many of whom have risen to this challenge, demonstrating a thoughtful and inquisitive interaction with their relevant artistic and cultural terrain.
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