Week Two

Still fresh in my mind! After the warm up this week was much fuller on... I for one found it both highly stimulating and not a little scary.

Greg Lucas gave a blistering tour de force of a lecture...that combined his personal approach to photographic practice with some idiosyncratic observations on research methodology, an introduction to the world of Joseph Cooper, why Jackson Pollock mugged Yves Klein and much more besides. Confused - you should be! Even though I have a background in fine art I was struggling to keep up with the intensity of the presentation. Greg is simply one of the most interesting and amusing speakers in the contemporary art environment and even though he 'reeled it in' a little for a 'proper' academic lecture all his hallmark humour was still on display. Its a priviledge to be on a course that can give us that kind of access to talent.

Paul Hill and Mike Simmons took a slightly more measured approach to help ease us into the idea of critical reflection and initial research and Mike in particular walked us through the first steps towards the methodologies we need to employ. I was struck by the strength of their conviction that the approach to the written components would serve us well in the making of our images. I have always been rather arrogant in my conviction that the creative act doesn't require that kind of explication...I often quote the painter Barnett Newman's "Theory is to the artist what ornithology is to the birds"...but I suspect I may find myself utterly discredited by the time we finish our first two modules.