Your spark and originality will allow you to develop into a dynamic, employable Illustrator. This diverse and visually enriching programme will help you succeed in graphic design, advertising, fine art, online and traditional publishing, interactive moving image, among the many burgeoning creative industries. You need imagination, problem solving skills and the ability to engage with your clients; their context and audience. This competitive and challenging Programme ensures you stretch your conceptual thinking and hone your drawing skills so your own visual identity will flourish. Through international competitions, exhibitions, briefs and commissions, your work is sure to stand out from the crowd.
The BA Degree in Illustration engages you in the key roles of a contemporary designer/illustrator developing career opportunities within graphic design, advertising, fine art, artists books, publishing, environmental design practices and the vast array of emerging and new media practices.
Illustration offers a diverse visually rich image making experience. Students on the BA degree will be encouraged to develop their individual style and identity through diverse experimentation with media, materials and techniques and through an intensely hands on and practical ideas development process.
Image makers on this illustration programme will investigate the possibilities of working with traditional tools and techniques, and their methods will vary widely: some working with pen, pencil and paint; others will create images using textiles, three dimensional construction, autographic / industrial reprographics and many will incorporate digital elements into hand-made art.
Academic and theoretical concepts are integrated into the BA Degree programme to give greater articulation to illustrative practice.
Design theory and vocational realism in all programme assignments is further enhanced by provision of a work placement opportunity taken in the first and second years of study. Placements and specialist discipline pathways will be in response to, and help to determine, personal career direction.
Throughout the BA Degree in Illustration, design research, drawing and image making experimentation are seen to be of paramount importance and are the creative catalyst to inform all problem-solving strategies. The ability to communicate information through Illustration is the key to becoming a successful designer/Illustrator. The programme positively endorses the contemporary practice of creating Illustrative solutions to graphic communication problems through exploration, evaluation and application of appropriate visual language.
The BA degree programme encourages students to take ownership of their learning through the acquisition of time management, scheduling and budgeting skills.
Validated by the Open University
