Wymondham High A Level Fine Art
Overview
The highly respected Fine Art course at Wymondham High Academy encourages a broad, creative, and contemporary approach which allows students to develop and negotiate a solid but rewarding grounding in Fine Art. The focus is predominantly two dimensional using traditional media such as painting, collage, photography, and printmaking alongside contemporary techniques including video and multimedia. The individual and creative approach which appears at GCSE forms the basis for A-Level study and further artistic progression.
Our course has a strong and established reputation for excellence. With access to outstanding facilities, tuition and technical support, students are nurtured to enable them to grow in confidence as artists and critical thinkers. They are encouraged to pursue their own creative ideas and interpret these into their own line of enquiry.
Course Requirements
Students to have a Grade 6 in a GCSE Arts subject or above and a good portfolio. Students applying for this course should have a strong base of traditional skills learnt at GCSE level.
Course Content
Component 1: Coursework – Year 12:
The beginning of Year 12 is an opportunity to explore practical and analytical skills in a range of structured mini workshops. Using large A2 sketchbooks, we look at and explore the different and varied approaches to drawing, mixed media, photography, printmaking, and painting. Enrichment opportunities include in-house life drawing and a visit to the Curwen Print Studios near Linton in Cambridgeshire, where students are given the amazing opportunity to develop their printing skills with practising printmaking artists. Students are taught how to develop critical and analytical skills and take part in group critiques to further their understanding of the formal elements.
After Christmas until June half term, Year 12 students develop a ‘personal project’ that enables them to work in an individual direction of their own choosing. Visits to artist studios and trips to galleries of national distinction are organised for the students to assist in their response to artists’ work. Students produce final outcomes for this project before the June half term in preparation to start their Personal Study in the summer term of Year 12.
Component 1: Coursework – Year 13:
Personal Study – Over the summer half term, students are taught how to analyse artwork and given a comprehensive grounding in art historical terms, concepts, and issues, as well as the influence of cultural, social, and political factors. Students are helped to develop ideas for their Personal Study. This usually takes the form of a written and illustrated essay in which students show the depth of understanding that they have about the ideas that inform and inspire their creative work, through investigating artists and designers. The Personal Study element is worth approximately 18% of coursework marks. Over the autumn term of Yr.13 students develop individual ideas and experiment with a range of media, culminating in an ambitious final outcome made before the Christmas holidays. Upon their return students spend the month of January writing and consolidating their Personal Study.
Component 2: Externally Set Assignment – Year 13:
A theme is provided by the Pearson exam board as a starting point for the students’ own ideas. Students begin work on this in February and generate a body of explorative and considered work in a new sketchbook or portfolio before producing a final practical outcome over 15 hours / three days in late April or early May.
Progression after A levels
A strong Fine Art background can also develop highly valuable transferable skills, including creative ideas development, problem-solving, contextual interpretation, and visual communication, as well as organisational, presentation, and team-working skills. Fine Art students can progress to Higher Education courses with a creative or cultural element such as fine art, art history, cultural studies, interior design, architecture, and graphic design. Studying at a specialist art school can lead to work as a professional artist. Entry to art school may follow a year’s Art Foundation course, dependent on the individual and the degree. Art restoration, digital animation, gallery management, art dealing, exhibition management, teaching, arts administration, fashion, and journalism are other possible career paths. The highly creative skills acquired through visual arts can also be useful in a wide variety of careers such as advertising, events management, and broadcasting.
*Creative Industries are worth £13 million an hour to the UK economy, outperforming all other sectors of UK industry. The creative industries contributed £115.9bn in 2019, 5.9% of the UK economy and accounted for 1.68 million jobs, 5.6% of all UK employment.