Programme Specifications

Programme summary

1. Programme Aims

• To provide a supportive and intellectually stimulating environment through which to facilitate students’ acquisition of advanced practical and critical skills in contemporary fine art practice.

• To embed the development of core practical skills – ranging across traditional and new media, 2D and 3D forms, analogue and digital processes – within an innovative and conceptually challenging curriculum.

• To deliver a broad understanding of art making, encouraging cross-disciplinary practice, innovation and experimentation in the student learning experience.

• To facilitate an understanding of diverse contexts for art production and consumption (within the studio and beyond) and foster a critical engagement with art’s historical, theoretical, cultural, political, social and ethical dimensions.

• To enable the development of independent, professional and adaptable working practices pertinent to a global art context.

• To prepare students for the manifold employment opportunities available in the creative industries, heritage sector and other cognate fields.

2. Relevant subject benchmark statements and other external reference points used to inform programme outcomes:

• The Benchmark Statement for Art and Design
• The Framework for Higher Education Qualifications
• The QAA Policy Statement on a structured and supported process for personal development
• Credit level descriptors for Higher Education, Sourthern England Consortium for Credit Accumulation and Transfer.

3. Programme Learning Outcomes

3.1 Knowledge and Understanding

 On successful completion of this programme, students should be able to:

• Initiate, develop and evaluate ideas, realizing them through outcomes, to generate a distinctive, professional and individual art practice.

• Use research methods related to art practice: locate and evaluate visual and textual sources, organise and develop ideas towards speculative enquiry, visualisation and/or making.

• Understand and engage with current debates in fine art through a rigorous exploration of contemporary art’s histories, theories and its wider social and political contexts.

• Integrate professional skills and enterprise within their art practice and demonstrate an adaptable approach to working in the cultural industries and cognate fields.

3.2 Skills and other attributes

a. Subject-specific cognitive skills:

On successful completion of this programme, students should be able to:

• Understand how the choice of media can affect the material and conceptual development of practical work.

• Articulate and synthesise ideas and information comprehensively in visual oral and written forms and present ideas and work to audiences in a range of situations.

• Research art’s histories and evaluate contemporary theories, concepts and discourses in the arts.

b. Subject-specific practical skills:

On successful completion of this programme, students should be able to:

• Demonstrate a high level of technical skill and knowledge in traditional and contemporary processes that are relevant to the creative sector and industries.

• Use, effectively, a range of materials and processes such as drawing, moving image, painting, photography, printmaking, sculpture, sound and performance, recognizing and responding to professional opportunities and contexts where appropriate.

• Develop a body of ambitious studio work through experimentation, technical innovation and evidence of thinking through making in the creative translation of ideas into practice.

• Engage with themes and issues relating to local and global contemporary visual culture, cognizant of the political and ethical implications therein.

• Demonstrate high-level skills in both visual and textual analysis and present research through such forms as essays, presentations, studio notebooks, blogs, dissertations and artist statements.

c. Key transferable skills:

On successful completion of this programme, students should be able to:

• Demonstrate an understanding and knowledge of traditional and new/emerging technologies, their uses and applications.

• Solve problems individually or as part of a team through collaboration and collegial cooperation.

• Manage complex long term projects professionally and work to deadlines.

• Demonstrate the ability to reflect upon and articulate their skills in a range of different creative, intellectual and practical contexts.

• Manifest an understanding of ethical issues and an appreciation of cultural diversity.

4. Programme structure

4.1 Part A - Introductory Modules

4.2          Part B - Degree Modules

Students must choose a 20 credit module from the indicative School-wide options.

Optional modules will be available in the following subject areas:

• History of Art, Architecture and Design

• Visual Culture

• Arts Management

• English, Drama, Publishing and Creative Writing

In the 2016-2017 academic year the available modules will be:

4.3       Part I – Year Out (Four year Programme only)

 Students choose one of the above options

4.4       Part C - Degree Modules

 Students choose either Route A or Route B in Semester one

Route A

Students choose either SAC940 or SAC941

Route B

Semester Two

5. Criteria for Progression and Degree Award

In order to progress from Part A to Part B, from Part B to C and to be eligible for the award of an Honours degree, candidates must not only satisfy the minimum credit requirements set out in Regulation XX but also:

• In order to progress from Part A to Part B, candidates must have accumulated 120 credits and successfully completed and passed the 10% assessment component in Academic Guidance and Professional Development in the module SAA921 and SAA922
• In order to progress from Part B to Part C, candidates must have accumulated 120 credits in Part B.
• In order to qualify for the award of a Degree, candidates must have accumulated 120 credits in Part C. 

Successful completion of Part I leads to the additional qualification of Diploma in International Studies or Diploma in Professional Studies.

Part-time students may negotiate the order in which modules are completed, subject to the following restrictions: 

• All part A modules must be passed before the start of part B of the programme.
• All part B modules must be passed before the start of part C of the programme. 

Students may transfer between full-time and part-time modes of study with the permission of the Dean of School (or nominee). 

Provision will be made in accordance with Regulation XX for candidates who have the right of re-assessment.

Reassessment will not be allowed in the Special Assessment Period (SAP) if:

• candidates have accumulated fewer than 60 credits in any part of the programme
• candidates have gained a mark of less than 30 in SAC117

6. Relative Weighting of Parts of the Programme for the Purposes of Final Degree Classification

Candidates' final degree classification will be determined on the basis of their performance in degree level Module Assessments in Parts B and C. The percentage mark for each Part will be combined in the ratio Part B 20 and Part C 80 to determine the final percentage mark.