Unit 1 - Part D
My journey in education
I have had a different journey within education to most. I am now home educated however I did attend both infants and primary school. I really enjoyed my time at school when I was younger although at times, I found it difficult with peers and sometimes I didn’t fit. When we decided as a family to be home educated, I was both nervous and excited to begin with. I now love it and I feel very free. Its really empowering to choose what I want to learn and how I want to learn. Its different and not everyone understands, we get funny looks sometimes but as my mother says, “its their stuff not ours”.
As a group we discussed our pathway and future. I am still deciding what to do and living what mum would say in the “present “. I love Maths, architect and being creative so I try to do these as much as possible. Where it will take me, I do not know. At the moment I am gaining GCSES and taking them early. I do work which I enjoy. Thinking of university seems far away from me at the moment and I have a lot of family members who did not go to university but are loving their jobs and are successful.
My Mum has always said spend your life doing something you love. There is more to life than just earning money. So, this is what I am doing.
As a group we researched some artists and had a virtual UCA tour. This was interesting to see and learn about other people’s journeys.
Aisha Young
We met Aisha Young and had the opportunity to discuss with her how she became an artist. I really liked meeting with her and was blown away with how much meaning was in her work. I like that she is trying to show what happens emotionally or inside the mind. She attended Wimbledon school of art and it was great to hear that she worked on the Harry Potter set – Chamber of secrets. She contributed to special effects and helped design the bones.
Her art work is amazing and she uses a variety of different mediums for example, acrylic pens, spray paint, biros and even blusher brushes. She also uses gold leaves for her artwork. She stopped doing films as she had a family and spent time with them.
Aisha works mainly with ink and prink which I liked as creates a different energy. She shared with us that she grew up with art and it was always something she was doing. It was mainly a hobby. She said she loved the passion that lays in drawing and painting. Her parents were not creative, instead they were scientific which led her not doing an Art A level to begin with. She instead joined art A level classes for fun and that’s where her career began. She went onto completing a foundation course at Hatfield College and she became interested in special effects and prop design. She now is a freelance artist at Nucleus Arts in Chatham.
I really loved Aisha’s work, it was real and had so much life in them but also some looked as if they were pulled from a dream. I found it reassuring that she found her path, her dream not the “normal “way but her way.
The above photo was taken in Aisha Young studio/Gallery. Weirdly I like my contrast of colour to the black and white artwork. It’s a lot like her work!
Figures Exhibition – Nigel Adams
Another artist at Nucleus Arts Chatham was Nigel Adams. I felt privileged to be able to be a part of such a meaningful project. It is lovely that he is taking so much time to tribute all the people that sadly passed away due to Covid.
As a group we met Nigel and had the opportunity to discuss with him his project “ Figures”. He was open, engaging and compassionate about his work. He shared with us that he is physically drawing the milestone of each of the 100,000 Covid related deaths in the Uk. The figures are created in rows of ten using a template on rolls of white lining wallpaper and can be in any style as long as it fits the space. Any artist can contribute. Its thought provoking and represents the life and death of each individual. Once it is finished it will be displayed publicly.
Nigel was so passionate about this and again I really love art that carries a message and is personal. After we spoke to him, he invited me to contribute. This was really emotional to be apart of the work, the art. It felt very personal and I really liked that. I like that art can be shared. I learned with Nigel how art doesn’t always need huge amounts of planning but can be spontaneous. I literally picked up a pen and contributed to the overall message. I really liked his freedom and it didn’t feel like it was going to be judged, it was people, my work and that was accepted. I really liked that.
UCA Tour
Due to Covid , we unfortunately couldn’t a tour in person however we had a tour of UCA virtually. UCA is based in Rochester Kent however it is due to close down soon which is a shame as it was purposely built for art and art studies. The host shared and discussed with us the different types of Art and the courses available. I thought it had excellent facilities for digital art/ research and it even had a gaming room which I was right up my street! This held my attention a lot and I thought maybe one day I could build or design a game. It was a good insight to see how far Art stretches , there are so many different areas of interest. It was good to see what maybe a college or university would look like if I decided to study art. The only downside of the tour being virtual was it lacked energy and atmosphere.
