In my class ‘The Meaning of (Graphic) Styles’, we’ve been given readings from ‘Subculture: The Meaning Of Style’ by Dick Hebdige each week. We’ve had discussions and analysed various elements of style, culture and how they’re effected. This is very different to Graphics at UWE as readings aren’t assigned, and we don’t really have discussion sessions that allow us to talk about design in a broader context. 

My other class that is also heavily weighted in terms of credits has also been very different to anything I’ve been able to do at UWE. This class is Drawing from Observation. So far, we’ve completed four assignments that have all been very different and allowed us to work on various drawing techniques and styles such as contour drawing, working on perspective, value, mark making etc. Crits are a large part of this class; we spend one of two sessions a week talking about each of our assignments. This is really valuable and helps me to reflect on my work by getting a lot of other people’s opinions. Overall, feedback is a much more significant part of courses here at VCU and taking part in these crits are significant to your grade. I think this is really useful and it would be good to do at UWE as we don’t get an opportunity to show each other our work and talk about it in depth. 

Yesterday was Valentine’s Day. It was Film Fridays, so the girls and I went to The Commons to watch Queen & Slim. It was a really good film and we also got a lot of free food and popcorn 🍿 There are a lot of events that VCU put on for free which is really different to that at UWE. There aren’t really any social events in Bristol that the uni organise so it’s nice having multiple events a week that you’re able to attend.