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(2007)Conference PaperThis paper discusses a studio-based lighting design project developed for second year undergraduate students in a four year design degree. The project is intended to develop student understanding of the technological and manufacturing requirements of the professional design process and has been repeated each year over a three year period during which time student responses have been gathered and changes made in response to student feedback. This paper highlights the benefits of real world experiences in the early stage of design education by extending the traditions of hypothetically and conceptually rich briefs, which impacts on the student’s future design process. The lighting project is based on a client brief/s that range from architectural lighting for commercial applications to lighting systems for emergency services. The project includes lighting workshops that explore the technical and ephemeral qualities of light and provides students with hands-on experience of industrial/manufacturing processes. It also extends understanding on the role of collaboration in obtaining a professional outcome, i.e. (producing working prototypes for exhibition). Students are required to source quotations from industry thus affording a tangible outcome and an understanding of the financial implications of their design outputs. Final working prototypes are presented in a public exhibition space, designed and co-ordinated by the student group. The educational benefits of ‘real world’ experiences gained by the students and its impact on their design process is analysed. Student evaluations are discussed in response to the project brief, including their response to working with industry. In addition, how the results have enabled a refinement to the project over time. By embedding opportunities for students to engage in industrial processes outside of the university they are more likely to assume a professional focus, share knowledge and engage in each other’s experiences rather than focus on individual achievements and grades.
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(2007)Conference PaperTo develop effective design solutions for end users whose life experiences, health, mobility, and cognitive functions are significantly different to our own, we must recognize and challenge our assumptions about those users. When we set out to inspire novice designers to practice in a field widely considered as he height of ‘uncool’, we also challenge beliefs about the nature of design itself. Introducing young novice designers to ‘Elder Design, (ED) i.e. design responses to the needs of people over the age of 65, achieves both these goals. It also meets a rapidly ageing society’s requirement for designers with an understanding of this user group. This paper presents an analysis of a graduating student’s design for a chair intended for residents’ use in a residential aged care facility (RACF) in south-western Sydney). Effective design solutions in this area require a multidisciplinary approach involving an understanding of environment-behaviour relationships, the ageing process, dementia, nursing practices, operations research, and ergonomic design for user groups with highly specific (but varied) needs. In addition to the end users, ED introduces students to clients such as RACF operators, who are themselves experiencing rapid change in the types of the services they provide and the care models which inform them. In this context, effective problemsolving begins with problem identification -- for all parties. Evaluated via interview and the analysis of design outcomes, the project provides an insight into possible approaches to developing education for user-centred design solutions across many fields.
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(2004)Conference PaperStrategies used in interdisciplinary needlework-textiles in public installation-performance are outlined. My paper discusses the particulars of my Irish Linen Memorial, begun in 2001, Justine Merritt's Ribbon around the Pentagon, 1982-85, and Suzanne Lacy's The Crystal Quilt, 1987. I discuss the sculptural use of textiles in public space and ritual, such as their historically political use as banners, as well as creations symbolic of the interconnectedness of life. More currently, textiles metaphorically illustrate violence and trauma inflicted upon the body, loss of life and the rupture of the fabric of social order which war involves. Cloth can be used as a reminder of displaced persons, the migrant identity and the plea for global stability. My collaboration with choreographer-dancer, Elizabeth Cameron-Dalman, OAM, is an example of international collaboration between Australia and Canada, on the issue of Northern Ireland's sectarian violence, 1969-2000.
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(2007)Journal ArticleThis brief article explains the non-hierarchical listing of all 'Troubles' deaths in the inclusive Irish Linen Memorial (renamed The Linen Memorial in 2007) - killings for which various persons/groups on either side of the political divide, as well as the security forces, were responsible. The artwork-memorial can be read as an anti-monument. The Linen Memorial (hereafter LM) acts as a 'modest witness' in reordering relationships and engaging a parity of esteem between Nationalist/Republican ('Catholic') and Loyalist/Unionist ('Protestant') communities during the post-1998 period when Northern Ireland is emerging from conflict. The use of the linen handkerchief as symbolic for heartfelt grief was what inspired me to use it, as a building block, to create a non-traditional and mobile memorial to those killed in the sectarian violence, commonly called The Troubles, in Northern Ireland.
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(2003)Creative Work (non-textual)Solo exhibition 'Here' at Yuill Crowley Gallery, curated by Kerry Crowley.
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(2008)Curatorial Output1) Elysian Fields, Tartarus, Asphodel Meadows and Charon the ferry man (Death Bird): A series of 4 paintings based on The Colonial Ghost story of Greenmans Inn This is the story of an Inn built on the Hawkesbury that turned into a violent place of murder and notorious act of cruelty. It was said the barmaids were kidnapped. Men were often tied down to rocks and drowned by the incoming tide or weighed down with rocks and feed to the sharks. The ghost of woman with a small baby now haunts the area, presuming both her and child died some horrible death. She is seen in broad daylight with a child in her arms. The paintings for this series focus on the ideas of settlement and civilization and the worlds and underworlds that souls inhabit. The painting Charon the ferryman (death bird) 172 cm x 160cm oil on canvas, ferries on a raft men up the river and into the adventure. This painting also uses bits of another story “The death bird” where strange screeching from a bird precedes a death. Elysian Fields 172 cm x 160cm oil on canvas shows the utopian existence of industry, like Prometheus or Vulcan a new civilization with laws and ideals, to taming the wild. Tartarus 172 cm x 160cm oil on canvas shows us what happens when the human condition turns for the worst. Lower than Hades, it is the place of monsters, the walls of the Inns cannon are like the tree layers of night that encompass Tartarus. In the painting the Asphodel meadows 172 cm x 160cm oil on canvas, it is the land of indifference, the in-between world of the soul, it shows a rowboat on a beautiful river, in it, a young woman, a small girl, and a mother breastfeeding her baby. 2) Convicts Bride and A Convicts Ghost: A series of two paintings based on the colonial ghost story of a convict and his bride A convict who protested his innocence was sent from England, and assigned to a landowner in Windsor, his wife followed and became a servant in the landowner’s house. The convict and his bride escaped with a boat down river. They were soon found and he was shot through the heart. His ghost is seen hovering over Cowan creek. The painting Convicts Bride shows the moment of capture. A young woman sits alone in a creek bed besides her in shallow pool lies a deer, shot through the heart, both strangers in their surroundings. A doe looks on while sulphur crested cockatoos fly away. The painting A Convicts Ghost tells of a woman who remains tied to a single point on the Hawkesbury River above floats the ghost of her husband. These works are attempts to use the language of mythology to help create history. A convict ghost is based on the work “The lady of Shallot” by Waterhouse a Pre-Raphaelite painting. The Pre-Raphaelites were anxious to create a mythology for England. The interpretations of history are as various as the individuals who report them. Sometimes the establishment of simple tales into historically important events are urged on by the need to have a history, any history. This history eventually becomes part of a culture. The lack of familiar local stories for the first settlers, I believe helped in the recording of so many ghost stories in Sydney and the Hawkesbury. Some Ghosts become famous such as Fischer’s Ghost, where an areas whole Identity can become associated with the tale. History Painting in general records events, its need is not as necessary now as before the industrial revolution. But History painting like photography or the documentation or any historical event can only tell a small version of that event, from a particular point of view and is usually politically loaded. History painting at present has the greatest scope it has been able to enjoy for some time, it’s no longer bound by the truth, or more, has to have the pretence of being so. Within the expanded field of Art I believe that history painting in particular exists on a plane bound on its edges by History, politics, fantasy, and documentary. 3) The subtle Serpents bite 1804, a Young boy is bitten by a snake, and is helped home by a stockman and his younger. The young boy dies. His grieving mother one day just disappears and is thought to have drowned. His Father is also drowned while trying to save some of his flock. The remaining son was moved to an uncle who dropped dead. The tombstone of the boy and place became known as haunted hill and school children often visited the site. The fascinating thing about this story is the imagery and the symbols, in the main painting, the subtle Serpents bite, the artifacts of the story, serpents, shepherds, flock etc, become the elements of a more familiar story of western civilization. It is as though the young colony can establish a history of tales that have the same structure and underlying moral as those from the lands the colonials left.
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(2007)Conference PaperIn the last few years especially, the notion of Graduate Attributes, and the expectation that they will be mapped through university curricula, has become increasingly standardised in the Australian university sector. Universities more and more articulate their role and purpose through a description of the qualities of their graduates (Clanchy & Ballard 199)], while these qualities are at the same time becoming increasingly generic and non-specific. The aim of this paper is to address the impact of that these approaches to curriculum development and management are likely to have in the Fine Arts and Design teritary education sectors, and on the lessons to be learnt from a recently undertaken curriculum mapping process at the College of Fine Arts UNSW.
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(2007)Conference PaperThis research takes the stance that identifying a previously unseen design example is a problem-solving activity that novice learners, particularly those who lack visual literacy skills, find extremely difficult. Learning in design history often involves presenting students, after they have been given a lecture, with appreciation activities of design examples. Such activities often do not take into account the limited capacity of working memory in that multiple examples of previously unseen material is shown and students are required to answer open-ended questions on a design’s visual characteristics without any teacher instruction until students provide an appropriate answer. According to Schnotz (2002), semantic processing is required in order for the viewer to comprehend a picture as opposed to merely perceiving it. Koroscik, Short, Stavropoulos and Fortin (1992) recommended that educators should not expect students to discover meaningful or accurate ideas about an artwork without teacher direction and input. These conclusions can also be applied to the teaching of design history. This research discusses the application of cognitive load theory, a theory usually applied to the teaching of maths and science, and theories of visual literacy to provide a theoretical underpinning for supporting techniques to improve students’ ability to recognise designers’ styles in higher education. Specifically it is suggested, that providing well-designed worked examples would be a more effective instructional method for promoting novice learning.
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(2007)Conference PaperAt the College of Fine Arts (COFA), School of Design Studies we offer a four year, integrated, Bachelor of Design, where design is the discipline, not the individual studio practices. One of the challenges in designing the First Year Design Studio Curriculum is that it is necessary to prepare students for six possible studios in years 2 and 3, and they are: Applied/Object, Environments/Spatial, Graphics/Media, Ceramics, Jewellery and Textiles. The first year also includes a number of contextual courses, Computing 1 & 2, Design History and Interactive Systems. How is it possible to incorporate into 2X14 week sessions all that is required? The first year of the Bachelor of Design, integrates theory, conceptual development and studio practice. As first year is the time to establish independent and critical ways of thinking, an integrated approach in the First Year is constructed to introduce an integrated approach. The current structure has been in place since Session 1 2005. This structure introduces students to a mix of experiences and diverse values: - A diverse range of skills - a diverse knowledge base - Global thinking patterns - Effective problem solving skills and - Learning transfer, where connections are made During the continual development of first year studios the aim has always been to develop ways to teach critical and independent thinking skills, a design process and the practical studio skills needed to achieve innovative design outcomes. Three key questions arise within an integrated design program are: 1. What does integration mean in design? 2. What does integration mean in a First Year design education? 3. How does integration translate in the upper years of a program when studio courses are specialised?
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(2007)Conference PaperThis paper reports on aspects of the author’s current ethnographic study of creativity in art and design education. The study examines the transactions between students and their teachers as students make temporal and graphic works using digital and photographic media in their final year of schooling. These works are publicly assessed in the high stakes NSW Higher School Certificate matriculation examination. Following Pierre Bourdieu’s theories of the habitus, symbolic capital and misrecognition, the study mounts a challenge to more conventional theories of creativity as, for instance, the result of genius or creative process. It argues that the micro-history and peculiarities of the cultural context as well as the linguistic exchanges between teachers and students at moments of creative origination are highly significant to concepts of creativity. It asserts that in the exchanges of symbolic capital between teachers and their students, differing levels of social tact, expressed in open secretiveness, euphemisation and denial are a necessity in efficacious exchanges. The paper provides a brief account of the design and methods. Results are retrieved from observations and interviews, augmented by visual means, using a form of semantic analysis and triangulation. An interpretation of selected results is provided. The paper concludes by questioning the extent to which creativity can be ‘taught’ and learned’ as if it were reducible to the delivery of a set of axiomatic propositions. Rather it proposes that the subtle social reasoning transacted in the context with all of its trust and riskiness is the most likely guarantee of shoring up creative outcomes. The findings have an application beyond the case and should be of interest to tertiary art and design educators.