Fine Art degree show

The pandemic has had an undeniable impact on this year’s graduating students. Yet, during the three years of their study, they have developed theoretical rigor in articulating and situating their work in the contemporary situations and acquired practical skills in conveying complexity in their work.

Since the lockdown in March 2020, their work has gone through notable changes. Limitations such as inaccessibility to the studios and the sense of uncertainty during the lockdown, at first, appeared only as an obstacle. However, they have taken the immediate predicament as an object of inquiry. Many of them had to re-orient their projects completely in the newly found spatial and social limitations. I remember an online tutorial during lockdown with a student who observed a fly trapped in her parent’s house. The student, inspired by her observation, used it as a visual metaphor for someone trapped in a cycle of domestic violence. The acute observation while searching for a clue propelled her work, leading to a timely critical piece that may resonate on audiences’ experiences during the lockdown.

Practice of art is comparable to long-distance running. Although it is not immediately obvious, each graduating artist has carried out a substantial groundwork, both in practice and theory, to come to this point of powerful and yet poignant conclusion of their study. All the work in this year’s exhibition is relevant to the world in which we have found ourselves during and after lockdown. The changes the pandemic has caused are not cosmetic but substantial in terms of work, life, art, relationships, inequality, and social and economic injustice. I see elaborate responses and nuanced artistic remedies for this re-territorialized world in this exhibition.

Despite the pandemic, this group of graduating artists has made an impressive display of flexibility, thoughtfulness and commitment. On behalf of the team of tutors, I would like to congratulate them for their achievement and would like to thank them for having inspired us up till the end of their study.  I wish for their many success and happiness, as they are ready for any challenges that life may bring.

Please note: Some of the work displayed below contains adult content which is not suitable for all audiences.