This case study follows on previous presentations to several international conferences (i.e. ConnectED 07, ISOTL 07, EPDE 08 and 09, International Sociology Association 08, IEEE CSCWD 09) and describes the progress and some of the Australian findings relating to an international industrial design studio project extending over four years between universities in Australia and the Americas. Primarily the project was run from the third year Industrial Design Studio 4 unit at UWS, the last creative...

In 2002 the University of Tasmania's School of Visual and Performing Arts and The Tasmanian Polytechnic (then TAFE) came together to form The Academy of the Arts, co-located at what was once the Inveresk rail yards. Originally Tasmania's largest industrial site, Inveresk and York Park is now the major cultural precinct in Launceston, Tasmania's northern city. It is home to The Academy of the Arts, the School of Architecture & Design, the School of Fine Furniture, the Australian Technical...

This case study describes how a postgraduate degree in cross-disciplinary art and design can be conducted in a fully online studio environment. The program comprises a structured sequence of core-courses which contextualise a wide variety of elective choices by illuminating their theoretical, practical and disciplinary connections. Electives include subjects such as creative thinking processes, drawing, sculpture, digital illustration, art curation, textiles, photography, understanding and...

This paper examines the Assessment and Feedback aspects of Studio Teaching as Creative Arts pedagogy. Prompted by USQ's newly offered Bachelor of Creative Arts (BCA), the author has developed an Assessment Matrix specifically designed to satisfy a number of imperatives, including: 'objectifying' the subjective aspects of creative practice as assessable coursework/research; providing the means by which accurate, detailed, personalised and confidential feedback may be provided to students...

The integration of theory within all practical studio courses at an undergraduate level equips students with the skills and knowledge necessary to position their chosen creative direction(s). We argue that critical and theoretical awareness enhances creative production and vice versa in a fluid and dynamic manner. We find that a central part of a Creative Arts education is an appreciation of the agency with which art can transform ways in which cultural issues are conceived and therefore...

This case study reviews and analyses the outcomes of an initial attempt to develop an alternative design studio model for lateral entry Masters students; one that departs from the concept of 'foundational' knowledge. The implementation of the Melbourne Model in 2008 necessitated a new approach to design studio education. Under this model, students with no design background but with an undergraduate degree are now able to study architecture or landscape architecture in only three years....

For twenty years the foundation or first year visual arts studio at Queensland University of Technology has been run on genuine interdisciplinary lines. With no studio specific areas as such, the course is constructed on conceptual lines largely determined by students emerging interests. The students also determine the media they will use. These student conceptual orientations are structured by projects (one per semester) that are broad and 'soft edged'. Within these projects students...

This Case Study relates to the creation and implementation of career-focussed courses in Creative Media for film, television, animation, broadcast and web contexts. The paper examines the advantages and disadvantages of co-teaching, and how different professional and academic backgrounds and disciplines can productively inform curriculum design and delivery in the academic/professional context. The authors, as co-creators and co-lecturers, have developed a number of courses which...

This case study looks at the 2008 trespass 3rd Year Interior Architecture studio at Curtin University. The students' task was to re-think urban space on their terms, to consider the culture, politics, society and micro-economics of urban as interior space, to deploy interior strategies and sensibilities in an unfamiliar, cross disciplinary realm. The context for studio program was Perth where the weather is fabulous, the beaches are the best, the economy is strong but the city is...

This case study addresses the issue of deskilling of tertiary Fine Arts students. As contemporary art practice has shifted from a primarily material to an increasingly conceptual activity, Fine Arts education has been transformed accordingly. In the colleges, Critical Studies has been introduced while formal technical instruction has declined. For many students, ideas and relations matter more than mediums or skills. And for an increasing number, it's as if "the desire to make...

This intensive studio aimed to engage students, collectively and individually, in identifying opportunities and constraints via a process of mapping, interviewing and observing. As an urban design studio students were encouraged to draw from specific site conditions to 'find' a final project. In some cases these projects would result in built outcomes, in others the proposal of community programs and in others long term strategic planning initiatives. The essence of the...

The Museum of Urban Mythology is a studio based design project for final year Bachelor of Interior Architecture students in the Faculty of the Built Environment at University of New South Wales. The project is important and innovative for the way it includes a critical content in design and how it uses an interdisciplinary approach to design education. Like most design projects, there is a brief that describes a "client", "project" and a "site", in this case an existing...

The architectural design studio project Continuous City is conducted in the second semester of Year 1 of the Bachelor of Design in Architecture degree at the University of Sydney. It is a sustained collective meditation on the contemporary city, advancing the architectural themes of assemblage and transformation with an emphasis on the generation of a single architectural proposal in a complex urban context. It commences at an urban scale. A 'generic city' of strict...

The integrated Fine Art program, an initiative between Riverina Institute of TAFE and CSU (2005), was originally available only to local Riverina based-students. The scope of the program has expanded with increasing availability of CSU subjects by Distance Education, realising demand from students in other regional NSW locations since 2008 (Tamworth; Dubbo; Albury and Orange). Students undertake local TAFE programs (as available locally) or TAFE programs as...

This case study provides an overview of a new Bachelor of Digital Media program, which combines TAFE Illawarra study in digital film-making and animation with University of Wollongong (UOW) study in Media Arts. The program is closely integrated so that students can obtain a TAFE Certificate IV at the end of the first year, a TAFE Diploma at the end of the second year and a UOW Bachelor of Digital Media at the end of the third year. The program will begin...

Studio teaching is core to a successful graphic design education. A great deal of information can be learned and analysed through a lecture and tutorial paradigm, but it is only through the doing that a design student can genuinely comprehend all that discussed verbally. Studio environments are, at their core, intellectual and social engagements between like-minded people determined to succeed both personally and professionally. It runs off a potent mix...

Art Studio Practice is a year 12 subject accredited in December 2008. The course sits alongside art production and art appreciation. Students must have art production or equivalent to gain access. Art Studio Practice filled a gap in Tertiary entrance scoring for those students serious about a future in the visual arts. Significantly it provides students with a new pre-tertiary visual art subject and the opportunity to continue their visual arts...

Design students are often underprepared and ill-equipped when verbally presenting their completed projects for critique, often running over the allocated time or not communicating clearly their design intent and process.This case study looks as how The University of Adelaide has adopted an increasingly popular presentation method called Pecha Kucha (20 slides x 20 seconds each) in its First Year Bachelor of Design Studies Program which has enabled...

This case study describes how gaming technology can assist architectural students design a 3D environment. The process allows students to be immersed in their designs while making decisions that affect that space. It encourages students to experiment more rigorously with light, materials, colour, etc when compared to the more traditional 3D model making materials such as balsa and card. Furthermore, the speed of this process maximises the design...

Collabor8 (C8) 2008 built on Collabor8 Projects (2003 to 2005) developed by Ian McArthur while working as Program Director of Graphic Design at LDHU (Donghua University) and Head Teacher of Art and Design NCI (TAFENSW). Collabor8 2008 formed a pilot study examining the online interactions of ninety-four graphic design and visual communications students from universities and colleges in Australia and China to examine the relationship between...

The main essence of this case study is to do with the question: How can the idea of graduate attribute development become engaging and explicit for both staff and students in the practicalities of a studio-based subject? It is all very well to say to students (and include in documentation) that the aim of the studio subject they are engaging with is to develop the graduate attributes that we believe are essential for a professional...

One of the key tools used to assess studio learning in architecture is the critique. Typically, the critique process requires students to present their designs and receive feedback from an assessment panel. In 2005, we became concerned that this process, in the context of second year learning was becoming less effective as students were not engaged in the process beyond their role to present. In addition, the critique process,...

This case study describes how Web 2.0 is used to improve critical thinking and analysis of the image and to ensure timely feedback and meaningful peer review processes. Students' photographic images are critiqued by staff or students from the wider cohort rather than just from their own studio class. Part of the peer feedback is incorporated into the assessment as well as students' interaction in discussion boards. Student...

This case study outlines the major review process of a foundation level Studio Design subject. The subject introduces organisational principles and concepts of visual design practice and has been running since 2002. It now requires a staged, major revision of content, conceptual frameworks; inclusion of indigenous content and a major redesign of delivery strategies and use of new technologies to accommodate a recent, rapid...

This intensive studio was offered to 25 second year Interior Architecture students. The studio sought to investigate issues with branding and identity, the unfolding of program over time and the relationship between the interior of a building and its urban surroundings.The studio compressed 12 weeks of core studio time within a period of 2 weeks. Due to the nature of the studio students had to respond to tasks within a...

One of the key tools used to assess studio learning in architecture is the critique. Typically, the critique process requires students to present their designs and receive feedback from an assessment panel. In 2005, we became concerned that this process, in the context of second year learning was becoming less effective as students were not engaged in the process beyond their role to present. In addition, the...

The critique, or spoken feedback, in art and design education is critical to the knowledge construction associated with creative project outcomes. It has been suggested that the traditional model of the spoken face-to-face design critique has become stuck with historical boundaries. Students and teachers report that spoken design feedback remains a weak component and a strong dissatisfaction within art,...

Keywords: interdisciplinary, creative arts, core courses, third yearT
his case study describes the role of a number of core courses in the third year of a Bachelor of Creative Arts degree at the University of Southern Queensland. In a major restructure of the Bachelor of Creative Arts degree, the disciplines of Music, Creative Media, Theatre and Visual Arts are linked into a single degree program and...

Porosity Studio is a special interdisciplinary course for undergraduate and postgraduate students in Fine Art, Design, Media Studies, Architecture, Urban Design, Landscape Architecture, Planning and Engineering. This intensive studio centres on a critical investigation of contemporary urban space and the intersections of public and private space, and begins with the need for architecture to be...

Keywords: Art and Design, core studies, first yearC
ore studies in Fine Art and Design is an introduction to fundamental themes, concepts and principles common to Art and Design studio practice. The two Core studies subjects complement studio majors (Painting, Sculpture, Photography, Printmaking, E Media and Visual Communication) and facilitate interdisciplinary practice by developing a common...

This studio tests the repeating of a studio programme/project/brief two years in a row, incorporating refinements based on reflection on the first delivery of the studio. It uses a template into which students position the elements of their design work, for example, plan, sections, elevations, perspectives, detail and writing. It necessitates a team approach but individual responsibility. ...

The Art and Natural Environment units form an introduction to the fundamental themes, concepts and principals central to engagement with, and creative representation of, the natural and altered environments in Tasmania. rnrnCentral to the delivery of each unit is the experience gained during two four-day field trips to remote areas of Tasmania.rnrnThe two subjects complement each other, as...

Over the course of an intensive workshop week at the Tasmanian School of Art (TSAH), each team of 3to 5 school students from across 16 state and private schools, worked collaboratively to develop sculptures under the instruction of John Vella (Head of Sculpture), technicians Ian Munday and Stuart Houghton, and a team of TSAH student volunteers. The sculptures were exhibited at the...

Patterns of formative assessment are commonly delivered through formalised review sessions and perhaps informal studio discussion. The structure of formal reviews usually places students in direct conversation with teachers but often excludes other students despite best efforts to be inclusive at the review. We cannot assume students develop a culture of informal peer...

CSTR (pronounced sister) is a compulsory part of study in the third year studios of E-Media, Furniture, Graphic Design, Painting, Printmaking, Photography and Sculpture. CSTR is not a stand alone unit but a component that interfaces with all third year minor/major studio units.Through providing a platform through which to develop context, methodology and conceptual...