Plymouth College of Art degree show unveils the latest student work

Students at Plymouth College of Art unveiled their work has been unveiled to the public.

Family, friends and VIPs from the creative industries arrived at the college for a private view of the degree show to see the work of graduating artists, designers and makers of the future at the annual showcase of degree students’ final projects.

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From fine art to fashion; ceramics to computer games; glass blowing to jewellery and sculpture; animation and film; graphic design and illustration; all creative disciplines were celebrated in the exhibition.

The Tavistock Place, Regent Street and Studio 11 campus buildings have been transformed again into a gallery bursting with art, which is free and open to the public until Friday, July 2.

A prize presentation took place with entrepreneurs and lecturers from the creative sector presenting awards to the most successful and promising students.

Steve Maynard, who picked up the prize for Fine Art Practices, built on the success of his work with his grandmother’s piano, which was hauled across Bodmin Moor. His latest work has been described as having a strong sense of locality; a south west flavour peppered with irony.

Janey Pointing, who won the award for Applied Arts worked at a stud farm and was unemployed as a single parent for years before starting College.

“At 16 I wanted to find my specialist area within the arts, but I didn’t know at that point just what it was going to be,” she said.

“If someone had told me it would be glass blowing I would probably have laughed at them!”

Janey won a Dartington Glass Scholarship and is going straight into employment with a company called Silver Tree Crystal in Somerset which produces handmade English crystal goblets and perfume bottles, which are sold in London and Dubai.

Her latest body of work Lunar Series is focused on creating contemporary sculptural vessels, using the sphere, which represents many things and is ‘worldly, tactile and has a beautiful purity within its form’.

Elizabeth Davey won a prize from the Plymouth College of Art Corporation. She recently lost her husband after caring for him throughout his illness. She also suffers from epilepsy. Some of her work in the degree show explores what it is like to regain consciousness after an epileptic fit. Due to problems with her shoulder she has had to learn to paint with her non-dominant hand.

Lizzie said: “I work with acrylic, emulsion and oil based paints. After a period of grief and continuing bereavement, my work has taken me into new areas.”

Prize winners are: Alexandra Lidster, Jemma Girdler, Laura Colmer, Martin Watts, Janey Pointing, Christine Sinclair, Sarah John, Corrie Warburton, Kelsey Fox, Amanda Buckley, Patricia Bruen, Sean Page, Steve Maynard, Diana Davydova, Donna Howard, Kelly Smith, Robbie Doran, Kate McLean, Steve Barrett, Serena-June Horgan, Sandy Litchfield, Rebecca Dodman, Elizabeth Davey, Euan Barker, Nicola Crabb, Oliver Alexander-Jones, Ian Clark.

The degree show opens to the public on Friday, June 25 and runs until Friday, July 2. Extended opening hours are offered so people can see the show during the evenings, until 8.30pm during the week, and from 9.30-4.30pm on Saturday.

(image: part of the art work promoting the Plymouth College of Art degree show)