module specification

This module requires students to develop the skills and knowledge required to undertake a researched, targeted exhibition or competition entry, or competitive submission for a commission, presenting the work they have developed within the major project in a professional manner. Students will apply understanding of the codes and conventions of competition, exhibition or commissioned work, contemporary curatorial practice, editorial and competitor approaches within a public exhibition. This will represent their independent critical position in relation to academic learning and professional practices.

The module demands a creative and disciplined approach to collaboration with relevant stakeholders and external partners. Within the module, students will experience work-related learning through live exhibition set up and realisation, submission for commission, competition or placement. Students will refine a range of transferable skills in communication, management, research and analysis and are encouraged to reflect and report on the work-relevant skills they develop throughout. Action planning, contribution to professional meetings, goal setting, negotiating, networking, project management, self-appraisal, team working are core to this module.
In the realisation of the exhibition/competition/commission students will develop and provide personal self-promotion outcomes to a professional standard, while negotiating the research aims of the brief and demonstrating mature creative practice.
The submission should reflect professional, creative and intellectual identity in preparation for entry to the workplace.

Completion and pass (120 credits) of previous level.

Through self-initiated individual and/or group projects, students will develop knowledge and experience of primary and secondary case study research, professional networking and working with teams in a professional context.
Students will practise professional communication and dissemination skills involving negotiation, collaboration and enterprise development through regular presentation of progress and findings.
Students will understand the significance of dissemination within related publications and platforms and learn to articulate their practice in a range of publication contexts.
Through research students will understand and develop subject-specific curatorial strategies for exhibition, commission and competition concept development and through considered reflection of their discipline focus.
Students will have the opportunity to explore public exhibition management, costing, planning and developing strategies for publicising exhibition events.
Through research and evaluation students will analyse their own and others’ exhibition outcomes and accurately place their practice within the marketplace.

Learning Outcomes 1 - 4

Scheduled teaching ensures that independent study is effective and addresses the learning outcomes and assessment tasks. Students are expected to, and have the opportunity to, continue with their studies outside of scheduled classes. There will be a range of learning strategies deployed and individual learning styles will be accommodated. The module’s learning outcomes, its contents and delivery, have been scrutinised and will be regularly reviewed to ensure an inclusive approach to pedagogic practice.

The module and course utilise the University’s blended learning platform to support and reinforce learning, to foster peer-to-peer communication and to facilitate tutorial support for students. Reflective learning is promoted through assessment items and interim formative feedback points that ask students to reflect on their progress, seek help where they identify the opportunity for improvement in learning strategies and outcomes, and make recommendations to themselves for future development. Throughout the module, students build a body of work, including reflections on progress and achievement.

The School’s programme of employability events and embedded work-related learning within the curriculum supports students’ personal development planning. Through these initiatives, students are increasingly able, as they progress from year to year, to understand the professional environment of their disciplines, the various opportunities available to them, and how to shape their learning according to their ambitions.

At the end of this module, students will be able to:

1. Knowledge and Understanding
construct and carry out investigative research into competition, commissioned work or exhibition practice in the professional field and develop effective proposals for the exhibition, publication and dissemination of work;
2. Cognitive Intellectual Abilities
evidence reflection on the effectiveness of the strategies employed in the execution of competition/exhibition through the reflective diary;
3. Transferable Skills
apply to a professional standard the necessary skills for competition or exhibition entry, submission for commission, design, curation, construction, reframing, installation, specification and publication in the discipline;
4. Subject Specific Practical Skills
position the exhibition/competition/submission within the range of industry contemporaries and articulate concepts confidently in professional presentation conventions.

Students will produce a coherent presentation of their competition, commission or exhibition experience, independent research development and findings, together with a critical evaluation of successes and opportunities for development.
This module will formatively assess the research, planning, critical audience/ client analysis and reflective diary at the end of each phase. The satisfactory completion of continuing independent studentship and professional practice will be continuously monitored and forms a part of the assessment requirements for the module. Precise requirements for the analysis, diary and studentship will be stated in the brief.
The final mark awarded at the end of the module will assess a range of practical outcomes, to include a contextualising portfolio, reflective diary and evidence of supporting research. Precise requirements will be stipulated in the module guide. Work must be carefully organised and presented to indicate the development of work and the content clearly labeled. Students must attend timetabled sessions.

Portfolio/Journal

A portfolio/journal of student–produced work addressing the tasks and criteria as set in the competition/exhibition brief, including research proposals, entry to competition/ competitive commission and/or exhibition and presentation of findings and proposals.

Hooper-Greenhill, E. (1992) Museums and the shaping of knowledge, Routledge
Bendon, H. (2000) in Journal of Media Practice, 2005, Vol. 6, Issue 3, A Place for Ambiguity: Articulating Practice as Research
Clarke, A. (2011) Design Anthropology: Object Culture in the 21st Century, Springer
Macdonald, S. (ed.) (1997) Politics of Display, Routledge
Schouwenberg, L. and Staal, G. (eds.) (2008) House of Concepts: Design Academy Eindhoven, Frame
Stiles, K. (ed.) (1996) Theories and Documents of Contemporary Art; A Sourcebook of Artists’ Writings, University of California Press
Tilley, C. et al (eds.) (2006) Handbook of Material Culture, Sage