Fine Art and Creative Writing (Placement Year) BA Hons - 2021 Entry

Course Structure

Lancaster University offers a range of programmes, some of which follow a structured study programme, and others which offer the chance for you to devise a more flexible programme to complement your main specialism. We divide academic study into two sections - Part 1 (Year 1) and Part 2 (Year 2, 3 and sometimes 4). For most programmes Part 1 requires you to study 120 credits spread over at least three modules which, depending upon your programme, will be drawn from one, two or three different academic subjects. A higher degree of specialisation then develops in subsequent years. For more information about our teaching methods at Lancaster please visit our Teaching and Learning section.

The following courses do not offer modules outside of the subject area due to the structured nature of the programmes: Architecture, Law, Physics, Engineering, Medicine, Sports and Exercise Science, Biochemistry, Biology, Biomedicine and Biomedical Science.

Information contained on the website with respect to modules is correct at the time of publication, and the University will make every reasonable effort to offer modules as advertised. In some cases changes may be necessary and may result in some combinations being unavailable, for example as a result of student feedback, timetabling, Professional Statutory and Regulatory Bodies' (PSRB) requirements, staff changes and new research.

Year 1

Core

• Fine Art Practice

  This module seeks to establish fundamental Fine Art practices and principles and initiate development of critical understanding of basic concepts, approaches, possibilities and ways of working. The module enables students to engage with the practical disciplines of painting, sculpture, digital art, drawing and inter-media practices that combine two or more disciplines. This creative work alongside academic work in LICA100 initiates training in thinking and making as a fine artist.

  This practical course combines technical skills with different approaches to the disciplines as appropriate to developing individual interests as a practitioner of fine art. The teaching and learning systems for this course are designed to expose the student to ways of working and thinking as a practitioner; to thinking visually.

• Fundamentals: Art (part 1)

  In this module, Fine Art ideas and movements are surveyed viewed through pairings of major exhibitions throughout modern history, from the birth of avant gardes in The Salon des Refuses (1863) and Manet and the Impressionists (1910), to major shows on Digital Culture, Neoliberalism and non-Western art in the 21st century. This module is designed to supplement, contextualise and enhance the essential knowledge and skills covered in the Studio Practice module, and develop study and writing skills that you will need as you progress through your degree.

• Fundamentals: Art (part 2)

  Continuing the study of Fine Art ideas and movements through pairings of major exhibitions throughout modern history.

• Fundamentals: Contemporary Arts and Design

  This module will introduce you to key methods, tools and critical concepts used by academics to understand a broad range of creative work, its discussion and practice historically and today.

• Introduction to Creative Writing

  In this module we aim to develop the skills, knowledge and confidence of apprentice writers and their command and enjoyment of the craft. The module approaches literature as something made by individuals out of their experience, imagination and knowledge, rather than as finished artefacts encountered as commodities. We encourage you to experiment with different forms and approaches, to discover your individual strengths as a writer, whether of poetry, prose or drama.

  Lectures provide insight into a syllabus of key skills, techniques and approaches to writing poetry, prose fiction and drama. Workshops are tailored to reflect on the content of the weekly lectures and put these skills, techniques and approaches into practice. You will discuss in detail each others’ works-in-progress, developing critical and editorial skills and insight into the writing process. These skills and insight are then applied to your own, as well as peers' work. The 'Reading for Technique' element of the module allows you to develop skills to read as a writer, rather than as a critic or general reader.

• Placement Preparation

  Your placement year is a terrific opportunity to gain experience in the workplace and to develop your skills and knowledge. This short module has been designed to help you find a suitable placement position and support you to make the strongest applications for placement opportunities.

  With the help of our experienced tutors, you’ll find out about the graduate job market, including what employers expect from the graduates they employ, as well as the specifics of Lancaster’s placement year scheme and how this can support your career development. Using a blend of face-to-face sessions and online learning, you will sharpen your job seeking skills such as researching job opportunities, and creating professional application documents. Our online learning platform provides an introduction to psychometric testing, advice on how to set up a LinkedIn profile, and information and support in relation to interviews and assessment centres. You will have the opportunity to develop a greater awareness of your personal attributes, set up a LinkedIn profile, and consider how to present yourself effectively to employers.

  The skills and practice gained during this module, and the professional feedback and support you receive, will prepare you for your second year when you will start applying for placement positions.

  This module is not credit-bearing, however you will need to pass the module assessment in order to continue on the Placement Year scheme.

Year 2

Core

• Critical Reflections

  This module provides an introduction to critical theory in the arts and its application to aesthetics and art. The first term concentrates on 'structures' in artworks and the second on 'identities'. The structure of the module is six three-week blocks: (1) ‘Form and Structure’, (2) ‘Semiotics and Authorship’, (3) ‘Phenomenology and Spectatorship’, (4) ‘Sex/uality and Gender’, (5) ‘Race and Ethnicity’, and (6) ‘Class and Society’.

  Weekly plenary lectures make connections across the arts, and weekly, two hour seminars/ workshops allow students to work in your subject groups (art, film, theatre, design) on ideas and examples specifically tailored towards these disciplines.

• Intermediate Creative Writing Workshop

  You will develop the key skills introduced in the first year with an emphasis on writing as process, exploring creative voice, identifying point of view, the implied author and authorial guises whilst considering the creative and interactive nature of reading. Lectures will deepen your engagement with, and understanding of, literary forms. Weekly workshops will enable the development of specific aesthetic and technical skills through participation in constructive criticism relating to fellow students’ work-in-progress. Through this process, you will gain a deeper understanding of many important concepts such as structure, linguistic texture and resonance, point-of-view, form, pace, characterisation, the mediation of tone, and reader awareness. While the learning environment will usually be in the form of workshops, certain weeks will be designated for focused and practical set tasks. You will be expected to read widely from modern and contemporary creative works and to explore the work of ‘writers on writing’. The aim of the module is to develop a closely edited creative and peer-critiqued body of work that displays your own form of expression alongside skills and insights developed through the module.

• Studio Practice

  This module develops your knowledge and skills in fine art thinking and making. The module prepares and encourages you to direct your own research and to develop a self-reliant and independent approach to studio practice. You will work in your own dedicated studio space with 24/7 access. You will be supported by specialist tutors who are practicing artists. You will belong to a tutor group led by dedicated tutors with expertise in your area of practice. To support your creative development you will engage in one-to-one tutorials, group tutorials, technical workshops, and peer-feedback. You will also be encouraged to visit exhibitions and attend our visiting artist programme of talks.

• Work Based Learning Preparation

  During your second year you will apply for placement positions. A range of positions will be available in different types of organisations, and you will be able to decide which are of interest to you. While a placement role may not be available in a field or organisation that is directly related to your academic studies, all placement roles offer valuable experience of working at a graduate level and gaining a range of professional skills.

  A placement year provides the opportunity to find out more about yourself and the type of career that is right for you. The aim of this module is to prepare you to maximise the opportunities for learning and development that your placement can provide, including any formal elements such as Professional Development Reviews (PDR) and opportunities for informal learning.

  You’ll consider your individual strengths and preferences through completion of a personality type assessment. This will be useful when we move on to looking at your aspirations for the placement. Working with others in the group and your tutors, you will be asked to develop strategies for achieving your goals and to record these in an action plan.

  You will need to successfully complete the assessment for this module in order to continue on the Placement Year scheme. This module provides 10 credits towards the 30 credits which successful completion of your placement year provides. These 30 credits are on top of the 360 credits of a standard degree, meaning that you will graduate with 390 credits; 30 more than if you took the same degree without a placement year. The additional credits recognise and reward the additional skills and experience that you will develop during your placement year.

  The University will use all reasonable effort to support you to find a suitable placement for your studies. If you are unsuccessful in securing a suitable placement for your third year, you will be able to transfer to the equivalent non-placement degree scheme and would continue with your studies at Lancaster, finishing your degree after your third year. The University offers a range of shorter placement and internship opportunities for which you would be welcome to apply.

Optional

• Art, Site & Interaction

  This practical fine art focused module will introduce the skills and sensitivities needed to work outside the studio through interactions with people, places, and technologies. The module introduces you to the way that current fine art practitioners employ a wide range of strategies for such interaction. You will work through practical projects and critical reflection. The course will begin with an art historical grounding for this area of practice. You will then experiment and test out new ways of working in a variety of locations and situations such as: in the rural or urban landscape, in the virtual online world, or in a social space such as a cafe. We will explore a range of processes such as conversation, performance, video, movement and digital interaction.

  Throughout the module you will build a range of skills and knowledge of technologies, for example: practical considerations in working ‘off-site’ (responding to and researching a place, collaborating with the public, gaining permission to work in specific sites); digital tools for working with networks and strategies and sensitivities for working with people (ethics, interviews, collaborations etc).

• Creative Non-Fiction: Genre and Practice

  You will explore the writing of creative non-fiction (mainly, though by no means exclusively, in the areas of memoir and biography) through the development, in a workshop environment, of your own work, combined with the directed reading of a selection of contemporary work and secondary texts. Over the course of ten weeks, you are expected to read and discuss each key text, and to submit your own work for workshopping on a regular basis. You are also expected to familiarise yourself with books listed as ‘supplementary’ and ‘background’ reading: the books are selected to offer different perspectives on the key issues raised. The module should be considered to have a cumulative effect, in that the books discussed early on may be drawn upon in later weeks to illustrate different aspects of writing. During the module you are also expected to keep a journal, in which you reflect upon your writing and reading. This journal will form the basis of the reflective element of your final portfolio, and it will be discussed in an end-of-term personal tutorial with your tutor.

• Documentary Drawing

  This module will enable you to develop a range of graphic skills with the opportunity to approach and represent ideas, issues and experiences in a documentary manner. The module is designed to be relevant to creative practice in Fine Art, Theatre, Film and Design. You will have the opportunity to expand your knowledge and experience of observational and on-site drawing, and develop their learning and experience by engaging in further technical training and by introduction to drawing beyond the studio and 'in the field'. On completion of this module our aim is for you to have significantly developed their knowledge and awareness of drawing and the ability to engage in independent study and develop a substantial personal project for assessment.

• Expanded Painting Practice

  The module provides training and experience in visual communication through painting in the broadest sense. Our aim is to provide students with an understanding of painting as an ‘expanded’ and interdisciplinary art form. Weekly workshops will introduce you to the scope of contemporary painting and some of its methods and approaches. You will develop skills through experimentation with a range of traditional and contemporary painting methods, approaches, ideas and equipment. Building on the teaching, you will develop an independent project that extends the language of painting beyond conventional bounds.

• Media & Performance

  This module aims to introduce key issues and practical skills in the production of video for media, performance, new media art and documentary film. The module will introduce the historical and practical applications of media technologies in art, theatre and performance by presenting the key practitioners in the areas of installation, multi­media performance, video, and new media art.

  A group practical project will introduce the use of video cameras, filming and editing, project planning, team work and the practical use of installation technologies. The module offers students the opportunity to work in interdisciplinary teams to produce a short film, performance, installation or documentary, including video and other media where appropriate.

• Perception and the Arts

  This module explores the relationships between the arts and how we see and hear. Artists are aware, consciously or unconsciously, of the processes and limitations of perception. They often play with our perceptions in their works to make something which draws our attention, makes us see something in a different way, or gives us a kind of perceptual puzzle or challenge. The module also explores recent scientific research on perceiving art and how that relates to ordinary perception.

  Assessment is by an essay and an exam.

• Poetry: Genre and Practice

  The emphasis in this module is on reading as well as writing poetry. You will explore how our own experience translates into poetry and how poetry becomes an experience generated by language, memory, imagination and form. You will be encouraged to seek out new reading as a result of seminar discussion. The writing of poetry is largely dependent on your abilities as a reader and interpreter of poems and on the textures of lived experience. Technique is vital to composition and it is strongly recommended that you buy or borrow a copy of ‘Rhyme’s Reason’ by John Hollander and ‘The Poet’s Manual and Rhyming Dictionary’ by Frances Stillman. You are expected to keep a journal throughout the module, the contents of which will be used to create the reflective essay for your portfolio.

• Short Fiction: Genre and Practice

  The aims of this module are to provide an opportunity for you to develop a knowledge of the short story form, and to develop your experience of writing the form. You will gain experience in reading, writing, workshopping and reflecting on short fiction, and will develop a knowledge of the history and development of the form, current theoretical approaches to reading and practice in this form, and an awareness of your own work’s literary context. The module will offer you the opportunity to develop your oral and written communication skills, enhance awareness of their approach to the creative process, and enhance your skills in the critical analysis of texts. This module is then developed by the third year specialization in short fiction.

  This module will explore the writing of short stories in a workshop environment through the development of your work, combined with the directed reading of selected texts. Over the course of ten weeks, you are expected to read and discuss each key text, and to submit your own work for workshopping on a regular basis. You are also expected to explore some of the books and essays listed as ‘supplementary’ reading: the books are selected to offer different perspectives on the key issues raised. The module should be considered as having a cumulative effect, in that books discussed early on may be drawn upon in later weeks to illustrate different aspects of writing. During the module, you are also expected to keep a journal, in which you reflect upon your writing and reading. The journal will form the basis of the reflective element of your final portfolio.

• What Is The Contemporary?

  This module aims to give students a grounding in “the contemporary” as a key critical concept used in artistic discourses, and provide a number of ways that students can explore and articulate their own contemporaneity. In conversation with cutting edge ideas from art, science, technology and popular culture, the module will enable participants to discuss and identify what they are contemporaries of, how they relate to their own time as artists, citizens and critical writers and what this necessitates in their own practices.

  Students will engage in critical discussion of key terms used to define the current moment, such as Anthropocene, Singularity, Post-Truth, and Globalisation, as well as understanding how particular technologies and phenomena, such as distributed and decentralised networks, virtual reality, artificial intelligence and genetic engineering are reshaping the contexts in which the arts are made. These topics are explored through lectures and seminar discussions in which students are encouraged to produce and define their own position and modes for articulating what makes them contemporary.

  The module is designed for creative students who wish to use writing and material practice to explore their own relationship to the ecologies, politics, trends, technologies, and aesthetics that typify our experience of the world today.

• Writing place and landscape

  This module is designed for those students interested in writing imaginatively about places and/or landscapes, providing a grounding for writers of poetry, prose fiction and non-fiction in the broad field of nature, environmental and place writing (which has been undergoing something of a renaissance in recent years). You will study key texts that engage with different kinds of place and landscape – from fields and forests to rivers and urban edgelands – and explore your own emergent interests in place writing. You will be encouraged to consider your own work as part of a larger, ongoing literary conversation about place, and to explore those places and landscapes that interest and excite you. The module also contains an element of fieldwork, linking the act of physically walking through a landscape to the practice of reading and writing about it.

Year 3

Core

• Work Based Learning Placement

  As well as developing skills and experience that are specific to your placement position and industry, your placement year should provide the opportunity to gain broader experience and professional skills in several areas:

  • analytical thinking, problem solving and decision making;
  • planning and negotiation;
  • prioritisation and time management;
  • critical engagement with theories and frameworks through applying them to real situations.

  During your placement year, although you will be working away from the University campus, you will be able to be in regular contact with other students via our online learning platform and with your Lancaster University tutors.

  You will be asked to review your experience on the placement and this will form the module assessment.

  This module provides 10 credits towards the 30 credits which successful completion of your placement year provides. These 30 credits are on top of the 360 credits of a standard degree, meaning that you will graduate with 390 credits; 30 more than if you took the same degree without a placement year. The additional credits recognise and reward the additional skills and experience that you will develop during your placement year.

  The University will use all reasonable effort to support you to find a suitable placement for your studies. If you are unsuccessful in securing a suitable placement for your third year, you will be able to transfer to the equivalent non-placement degree scheme and would continue with your studies at Lancaster, finishing your degree after your third year. The University offers a range of shorter placement and internship opportunities for which you would be welcome to apply.

Year 4

Core

• Advanced Creative Writing Workshop

  You will further develop key skills introduced in the second year, with an emphasis on writing as professional practice and process, exploring creative voice, identifying point of view, the implied author and authorial guises whilst considering the creative and interactive nature of reading. Lectures will focus on professional practice, publishing, and the career opportunities available to graduates. A proactive workshop environment will enable the development of specific aesthetic and technical skills through participation in constructive criticism relating to your fellow students’ work-in-progress. Through this process, you will gain a deeper understanding of many important concepts such as structure, linguistic texture and resonance, point-of-view, form, pace, characterisation, the mediation of tone, and reader awareness. While the learning environment will usually be in the form of workshops, certain weeks will be designated for focused and practical set tasks. You will be expected to read widely from modern and contemporary creative works, to explore the work of ‘writers on writing’ and to draw on relevant literary theory where appropriate. The aim of the module is to develop a closely edited creative and peer-critiqued body of work that displays your own form of expression alongside skills and insights developed through the module.

• Advanced Studio Practice

  This module supports you to develop your own distinctive voice as an artist. Our aim is for you to take increasing responsibility for the creative and conceptual direction of your artwork. You will work in your own dedicated studio space with 24/7 access and be supported by specialist tutors who are practicing artists. You will belong to a tutor group led by dedicated tutors with expertise in your area of practice. Teaching is delivered through one-to-one tutorials, group work and peer feedback. You will also be encouraged to visit exhibitions and attend our visiting artist programme of talks. The module culminates in a final end of year public exhibition.

• Dissertation

  This core module is directed towards completion of an independent research project on a topic of your choice, presented in the form of a dissertation. The course is taught through lectures focused on research skills and one-to-one supervision. Students of Film can choose to make a short film as part of their project, and students of Design are encouraged to do a practical design project.

• Work Based Learning Reflection

  In your final year you’ll return to Lancaster to complete your degree. Feedback from previous students is that their final year studies were enhanced by the real-world experience they were able to draw on.

  Whatever your career path, having the skills to critically evaluate your own learning and development will considerably enhance your effectiveness in the workplace. During your final year, you will be asked to reflect on your experience of work based learning. Did you take part in any formal training during your placement? How did this benefit your work? What kinds of informal learning opportunities arose? What did you learn about your own preferences for professional development? How do your experiences compare to those of other placement students?

  You will be asked to consider your future career aims and identify areas for further development.

  This is an assessed module that provides 10 credits towards the 30 credits which successful completion of your placement year provides. These 30 credits are on top of the 360 credits of a standard degree, meaning that you will graduate with 390 credits; 30 more than if you took the same degree without a placement year. The additional credits recognise and reward the additional skills and experience that you have developed during your placement year.

Optional

• Advanced Short Story: Form and Practice

  This unit will provide an opportunity for you to develop their knowledge and skills of the short story form, history and practice with a more advanced module. Each week you will have the opportunity to discuss, in detail, one or two specimen short stories and workshop your own creative work. Topics covered will include:

  • plot, narrative and 'the twist in the tale';
  • the epiphany and other ways of ending;
  • writing extreme experiences
  • rewriting fairy tales, folk tales and myth
  • flash and sudden fiction;
  • voice and place
  • genre (the ghost story)
  • short stories in the literary world - the web, festivals, journals and competitions.
• Contemporary Dance and the Visual Arts

  The module has two aims. Firstly, it aims to explore methods of improvising or choreographing movement from the practice and study of drawing, and, reciprocally, approaches to drawing that emerge from the experience of movement and the analysis of motion. This is assessed through either a staff-supervised, student-led group choreographic project with documentation or, alternatively, a portfolio of drawings presented at the end of the module. Secondly, the module examines twentieth and twenty-first century works in which choreographers have collaborated with visual artists. This part of the module is assessed through an essay. Teaching is through lecture, seminar and practical compositional exercises in movement and drawing.

• Creative Non-Fiction II

  You will explore the writing of creative non-fiction through the development, in a workshop environment, of your own work, combined with the directed reading of a selection of contemporary work and secondary texts. This module builds both thematically and technically on Creative Non-Fiction 1, which was introductory and primarily concerned with biography and memoir. This module will concentrate on reviews, essays, and cultural reflection. Over the course of ten weeks, you are expected to read and discuss each key text, and to submit your own work for workshopping on a regular basis. You are also expected to familiarise themselves with the books listed as ‘supplementary’ reading below and ‘background’ reading (available on Moodle): the books are selected to offer different perspectives on the key issues raised. The module should be considered to have a cumulative effect, in that the books discussed earlier in the term may be drawn upon in later weeks to illustrate different aspects of writing. During the module you are also expected to keep a journal, in which you reflect upon your writing and reading, and which will form the basis of the reflective element of your final portfolio. This journal will be discussed in an end-of-term personal tutorial with your tutor.

• Expanded Drawing

  The module will be taught through workshops which examine the methods, process and approaches in drawing that are at the cutting edge of contemporary fine art drawing practice and at the boundaries of other disciplines. The workshops provide knowledge, skills, and opportunities to test and try approaches. This learning will be developed through independently researched work. This independent work is documented in a sketchbook and extended at the end of the syllabus to provide a final major project.

• Longer Fiction: Skills and Techniques for Approaching a Novel

  During this module you will examine, through the set reading and in-class writing prompts and tasks, the unique features of long fiction (novellas and novels). Through seminar discussion of set texts, the workshopping of creative writing in progress and the writing of synopses and other planning documents, you will develop competence in approaching a long fiction project. This includes: strategies for planning and structuring, choosing point of view and tense, developing plot, addressing theme and characterisation, experimenting with form and considering an ending.

• Narrative and New Media

  This module will provide the space for you to work on a creative project that utilises opportunities afforded by new media. New media narratives (please see the list of set ‘texts’ for examples) are often interactive, participatory, immersive and cross-platform and you will be encouraged to design and provide writing samples from a project that engages with these features. During the module you will examine a variety of new media narratives, compare them to non-linear ‘old media’ narratives (books!) and you will work towards placing your own creative work in a literary and critical context.

  The topics we will cover will respond to your own project ideas and interests, but may include:

  • Interactivity and immersion,
  • Space, place, mapping and journeying,
  • The problem of character,
  • Who is the author? Collaboration and crowd-sourced fictions.

  Note: while we will talk about the ways these narratives can resemble games, this is not a module where you will be designing a computer game. You do not need to have any special computer skills – only an interest in the opportunities afforded to writers by new media forms.

• Poetry and Experiment

  This module aims to challenge the received structures of language in your own poetry through a close reading of poets who opened up new frontiers of 20th/21st century literature through their experimental approaches to language. Every seminar will be split in two; the first part will be devoted to a close reading of experimental work by a published poet, from Alice Oswald to Ezra Pound, looking at how they stretch or break the lyric formula; the second part will be a workshop based on critiquing the students' own poetic experiments. You will receive a basic introduction to Wittgenstein's theory of language games, with each subsequent poet examined in the light of how they try to break the rules of the game. Your own experiments are encouraged as either continuations of the radical departures first implemented by the poets in question, or your own attempts to break from comfortable notions of confessional or lyric poetry.

• Writing/Reading Poetry

  ‘No art without the resistance of the medium’, Raymond Chandler once said. This module will build on the Writing Poetry module, deepening your engagement with both the writing and the reading process. Poetic form will be explored through a wide-ranging selection of poems (all of which can be found in the set text for the module: The Making of a Poem (ed. Boland and Strand) and Poetry By Heart’s online anthology. We will consider form as historical poetic model and a tradition that has been questioned, adapted, subverted, upcycled, reaffirmed—rather than the binaries of free/formal verse, open/closed form, etc—and there will be particular emphasis on those forms regularly employed or reimagined in a twentieth century and a more recent contemporary context.

  A portion of each seminar will be spent discussing the set poems. You will submit your own poems on a fortnightly basis. The dual assessment (a portfolio of students’ own poems plus a close reading of two of the syllabus poems) reflects the module emphasis on the inter-relationship between reading and writing.