A short film of the City of 1000 stories workshop

Here is a short film of the workshop that the 'City of 1000 Stories' team run last week Thursday at Outline. Many thanks to Halilibrahim Shevket who recorded and edited the short film. 

City of 1000 Stories workshop at Outline

Last week Thursday all lecturers and supporting staff within the Directorate of Computer Science, Creative Digital Media & Performance and the Directorate of Design, Retail & Creative Commercial Enterprise, came to Outline to take part in a series of workshops. The workshops were designed to interact with and engage audiences from both art and non-art-related backgrounds. The different activities prompted individuals to tell their personal stories in relationship to Birmingham and the college in form of drawings and digital image manipulations. Some of the activities also worked well as a collective story, as they recorded the various cultural and ethnic backgrounds, interests and experience which is the make-up of the two directorates.

Prompted by different terms such as 'Career', 'Leisure', 'Heritage' and 'Magic', individuals recorded their own stories.

Prompted by a set of questions about identity individuals used their responses to design with typography.

One of the activities recorded how individuals felt at the present moment, forming a pose that expresses an emotion to creating a silhouette-drawing around bodies in space.

The final activity of the day recorded individual journeys across the globe (above) and as citizens of Birmingham and surrounding areas (below). During the activity, maps of the world and the local areas were used as guidance and later switched off to reveal beautiful, intricate drawings.

A delegation from Russia visit the Outline Department

A delegation from Russia on a recent visit to the Outline Department become involved in one of our drawing workshops. 

 It was great fun to engage with a much wider audience and our Russian visitors seem to enjoy their tour. It gave them a chance to talk to our staff and students about how we approach the teaching of art and design in this country.



Olympic Family Day

Experimental drawing workshop at the Olympic family day held at the Matthew Boulton campus. The drawing workshops were combined with a host of other activities across the College celebrating the carrying of the Olympic torch by the principal and two college students. This exercise is designed to encourage those not  involved in art to express themselves through the tracing of a body shape that expresses something about their feelings on the day.

Hold still mum almost finished.

Some body shapes were more flexible than others as the sports team came to participate.

Participants were asked to express their stories through the position of their bodies and this father has obviously had a hard day!

Group exhibition - Oh What a Lovely War

Following on from the seminar and workshop, which was run by Robert Perry RBSA in May 2012 at Outline, a selection of the work produced during the workshop was shown alongside Roberts' earlier work that he had done as a young artist at the Old Joint Stock Theater in Birmingham. The group show of students' and Roberts' work was shown to support the play 'Oh What a Lovely War' by Charles Chilton, which was performed by a group of Extended Diploma in Acting students from BMAPA. A selection of work that had been produced during the workshop was also projected during the play to support the actors and set the scene.

Outline would like to thank Robert Perry once more for his continued commitment to give up his time, to prepare and help set up the exhibition. 

Student's work from the workshop (white frames) alongside Robert's drawings (wooden frames).

 Two large scale oil paintings that Robert did inspired by stories, images and poetry of the Great Wars.

 BMAPA students during the play of  'Oh What a Lovely War' by Charles Chilton.

University level fine art HND exhibition

The University level HND fine art course featured several overseas students from Brunei again this year who are in Birmingham to study  at the college and progress on to Birmingham city University. Ahmed brings an interest in graffiti which is  universal in style with a distinct approach to contemporary art that is informed by his unique cultural background.

Open Day

Interactive activities for open day at Outline, introducing parents and friends to drawing activities that are designed to engage people with no art experience. Participants are asked to express something about themselves and their stories through their body position which is then traced by a partner. This simple activity turned out to be a great icebreaker and led to some poignant stories being expressed by simple outlines.

Another interactive open day experience where participants are encouraged to trace their journey into the College. The drawing can only be decoded by those who participated since once the map projection is switched off a student linear abstract drawing only remains.