Its feels like its been ages since I have had the luxury of walking into my studio, sitting down and working on the sculpture in front of me. The structure of this semester more than any other seems to put demand on everything but studio work/making and it has been driving me nuts! I think a big part of it is having GAs that do not directly pertain to our studies, and partly the time intensive nature of the classes I am taking, but in conversation with peers it seems like its not just me. I understand that there is allot more to grad school than making work, but at times like this it seems like time for work is getting a little shafted. I guess I am just wondering what you all think or feel about the structure of our graduate program, and its relation to our studio practice? do you all feel like you have sufficient time to work on art specifically in your concentration?.... Any way I made this post because I finally got a chance to hollow this out.
funny because i was talking to some sculpture grads in our print class and they said that almost all the time in their grad class is devoted to working on sculptures. there are a few classes set aside for presentations, but they also have 1,1/2 - 3 hour crits per person. . .you know that can't happen all in class either. I think the things assigned for our ceramics class have been, and are planned to be enlightening. and so far it has been stuff that i don't know if i would do on my own. i think if everyone has the same mind set and attitude that if we are going to take up everyones time, we should make it as beneficial as we can for everyone else, and on the other hand, if i HAVE to be here, i might as well have a good attitude about it to help benefit everyone involved, than i think we can look at the time spent and say, even though i didn't get much done if anything in the studio, it was worth it because i learned something.
ReplyDeleteAttitude is the key SUCKA!
and having 2 studios, with your approach to art making, it can be really intense, your not a just wing it kind of guy. . . and it shows in your work, but also wares on you to.
Finding time to work in the studio will always be a struggle- you have to sneak in 20 minutes here, an hour there.
ReplyDeleteKevin,
ReplyDeleteWhile I was at Edinboro, I think I had a different perspective on this. I would have said something like "Well, this is school and...." You can probably just figure out what the rest would be. Now that I am gone though, I realized that it did really (for lack of a better word) suck. I remember when I visited, they told me that it was all about the work. But like you said, I think the structure really takes most of your time away from what you are there to do, which is produce work! I realize that once you are done, it will be tough to find time (depending on what you are doing with your life). BUT, I always thought that was the point of grad school, to have all this time to devote to making work. I agree with you about the GA. While I was always grateful that I had one, I also felt like every week I wasted 18 hours in the slide library that could have been used to do almost anything else and it would have been more productive. You may have felt the same way? This was something I really considered in applying to new schools. I wanted to make sure that if I was doing a GA, it would ultimately be a beneficial learning experience that would help in my career.