Locating Unit

Demonstrate independent thinking and time management through the authorship of a self-initiated brief.

I found it interesting but also difficult to come up with a self-initiated brief for this unit, I think this was mainly due to the pressure of finding an idea that is good enough to develop a whole unit around. I think my fear at the start when I became stuck on the textiles outcome was focused on that I had made a bad decision for my chosen inspiration, I thought that I had started down a path that didn’t have much to offer. However due to the fact that I became stuck pretty early on, it meant that I had time to push forward, develop and come up with some really interesting final collections. Time management for this unit was probably the most difficult, mainly for the fact that we had to do a live brief along-side our self-initiated brief. Not only that but I chose to take part in both live briefs put up by Tigerprint through-out the duration of the Locating unit, and whilst it was difficult, I do not regret my decision, and I will continue taking part in Tigerprint briefs along-side my studies. I think it helps to see what industries are asking for and it helps to build your understanding on contextualising your work into a format that is required for the world outside of university.

Demonstrate the ability to explore, critically analyse and develop practice.

I think my sketchbook is the best demonstration of me exploring and developing my practice, it shows the confusion and resolution in my thoughts, having odd pages of research or designs that didn’t really link to the work before. I also think a lot of my thought process was exposed during my tutorials, I knew that being honest with myself and my tutor about positive and negative areas has helped me resolve issues quicker and build on my strengths, so even though this was more of a verbal demonstration I think it is the thing that has worked best for me on this unit.

Illustrate that they can build and use networks and contacts as a career development resource.

I have really enjoyed taking part in the live briefs for this project I think I has given me an understanding of the requirements for work out in the ‘real world’. It has also opened my eyes to the amount of competition out there in the textiles world, which has only motivated me to work harder and push further to achieve my goals. I have started to try build networks with the outside world, a couple of months ago I contacted a shop from back home ‘Handmade in Yorkshire’ it is a local craft store that will help you sell your work through the store, and I thought this would be a good place to start. I got a positive response and the owner of the shop said she would be happy to look at my work and sell it through her store.

Demonstrate evidence of testing and presenting individual practice within a professional textiles context.

I think my biggest risk and demonstration of individual practice for this unit was the overall concept of photography. Everything I did for this was self-taught. It was very much out of my comfort zone, however I think it was successful, helping push me towards new areas. Taking photographs on film and developing them myself was something I have never done before, and I think it was a huge success, some of my preferred designs have come from the film frames. Also the fact that I physically double exposed the film, a technique that no-one thought would work, (including the photography technician) has made me extremely proud that I didn’t give up and tried it again. Even though most of my initial research was a photography context I think it has transformed into a textiles print context well and I think doing this unit has definitely pushed my digital print skills forward.

Manage own professional development reflectively

I think that looking back on my blog I have demonstrated my ability to reflect and develop, discussing what was successful and where I want to progress and also when I have had a slow week where I haven’t progressed forward. Overall I think that being able to criticise your own work and develop based on that is very important and something I try to do now for every unit.

Conclusion

Overall I think this unit has definitely pushed me out of my comfort zone, which proved difficult at times, but I feel it has helped me develop my skills and understanding. The intentions of this unit was to show us how to start producing work suitable for the ‘real world’ and I think it has been successful in doing so. My biggest achievement from this unit was producing four mini-collections from one source of visual research, this has taught me the invaluable lesson that no matter what your starting point may be, you can always tailor it to be suitable and create something interesting and unique, and in fact it is normally the most unusual starting points that develop into unique work.