A group of art students from Bracknell and Wokingham College have created 3D letter models as part of a recent project. The finished pieces of art are currently on display in the college’s refectory.
This is the first time that students from the Church Road campus have done this project as students now study creative pathways awarded by University of Arts London, in line with other Activate Learning colleges.
The unit is based on words and meanings and how to portray the word in the decoration of a 3D piece of artwork. Students could choose any four or five letter word they wanted.
Before the final outcome, they produced maquettes using a wide variety of 3D materials including clay, foam, card and papier-mâché in different scale sizes to the final 12-inch models.
Most of the students used foamboard for the final outcomes as it is a good 3D medium to make models from and is used a lot in interior architectural design. They sourced their own design materials from around the art rooms, home and online.
Students drew upon several subject matters as inspiration for their final models which included meanings of their chosen word, nature, real-life situations, personal interests, literature and popular culture.
Amber is studying an Art and Design Level 2 Diploma at Bracknell and Wokingham College.
She said: “I did the word ‘free’ because while I was doing the project, I was a patient in a mental health unit of a hospital. I was coming into college as a step into the community and when I finished the project, I got discharged so I chose to give my project a hospital theme and made it as a recovery piece.
“I added things like medicine bottles, sheets to look like hospital sheets, I used tic-tacs to look like pills and butterflies because butterflies were something that I related to while I was recovering. It was a chance for me to express what I was thinking about without having to talk about it.
“This project helped me to open up as it was one of the first projects that I did at college where I put myself into it and thought about it. Since then, a lot more of my art has been more reflective.”
Liam said: “I did the word ‘ship’ and designed it to look like a range of different ships from the second world war, because I was playing a computer game at the time, which is based around the idea of commanding these replicas of second world war ships. I wanted to convey the word visually.
“I chose this course because I wanted to get into concept art. This project has helped me with creating 3D elements and shapes.”
Jan Allen, Visual Arts and Design Lecturer at Activate Learning said: “This project has allowed the students to explore their own creativity.
“They had lots of fun with it and used lots of different methods and techniques to create their models.
“They also used elements of English as they learnt about meanings and interpretations of different words, and also maths, as they scaled up their maquettes to different sizes.”
Find out more about the visual art and design courses that are available to study at Bracknell and Wokingham College or contact us on 0800 612 6008.
