Fine arts graduates (l-r) Glynis Lee, Jane Hemsley, Emma Long and Anna Constantini
Visual arts students at Charles Darwin University will signal the end of their bachelor degree course with an exhibition of their work from November 10.
In what has become traditional in fine arts courses around the country, the students are celebrating their graduation with a public display of their skills as painters, installation artists, sculptors, photographers and multi-media artists.
The graduate exhibition, entitled Eclosion, will feature works by 16 artists who successfully completed the Bachelor of Visual Arts. The title Eclosion is a reference drawn from the insect world to the emergence of the adult insect from its pupal case.
“The over-arching themes of the works are spirituality, self-identity, politics, society and landscape,” says lecturer Tobias Richardson.
“But there is a hybrid nature to much of the work—the students are likely to incorporate sculptural elements into photography, or combine an installation of found objects with DVD images,” he adds. “There is even animation and stencil art.”
Mr Richardson says this year’s graduates had developed a sense of collectivism over the years of their course, and had shown a high degree of resilience in the face of changes within the University.
“It’s this resilience that will help them make it in the art world,” he says.
The 16 graduates range in age from 20s to 50s, with the overwhelming majority of them women—only two men will graduate.
Eclosion opens at 6pm on November 10 in building 14, School of Creative Arts and Humanities on the Casuarina campus. The exhibition runs until November 18.
VET students will also show their work in the exhibition Smudge, opening at the same time. The students have been studying certificate IV in visual art and contemporary craft.
Smudge is in The Gallery, Building 12 until November 18.