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NSCAD Interventions -  Proposal Ideas

1. Spirit of the Institution - Create an entity, as a costume or puppet, that personifies NSCAD as a mythical creature of sorts. Among many students and possibly faculty too, NSCAD is believed to be “lost”. It doesn’t know where it is heading, or which way to go. The idea behind mythical creatures is that the stories surrounding them involve people attempting to find these creatures… but these creatures are fiction… myths. Our very own institution, NSCAD, is perhaps searching for a “mythical creature” of its own… a mythical creature which represents financial success, healthy community, student well-being (HA FUNNY)… but these desires seem to remain as elusive and unattainable as is the mythical creature. This project could be a series of photographs, or short videos/animations.

2. NSCAD Dollars - Let’s face it, NSCAD has a fair amount of mice. We have all heard about the issue, or seen the mice for ourselves. They’re quiet, they scurry around often unnoticed, they get in our studios and in the strangest places, but indeed, they are there. So, create a short animated film to depict NSCAD’s money issue as the mouse issue. Create “NSCAD Dollars” or use other fake cash, or real cash, and animate the pieces of money as though they are mice which live and move through the NSCAD campuses. We never know where exactly they are, or what they are doing, and they are hard to catch, and hard to see, but cute to look at.

3. The NSCAD Machine - NSCAD, like any institution, functions through a means of systems. Students, government and donors provide NSCAD with money and resources (forms of fuel). Administration then redistributes and allocates money and resources to the employees and students to follow programs in order to learn skills, make connections, make “good art”, and for students to ultimately attain a degree. But the system is far more complex and intricate. And the machine isn’t operating well. Make an animation of a sort of machination that represents NSCAD and how it is functioning. Show where the machine is faltering, and then create a solution or series of solutions that are applied to this “mechanical” problem and help make the machine function properly and effectively.

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Excluded "Things" from the Art School

Sports - NSCAD Athletics... Why is athleticism absent from art school culture?

Sense of Family - Limited to class time? If even then...

Employment and Sense of Financial Security - lack of reassurance?

NSCAD Pride - Am I proud to be a student of my institution?

Green Spaces - (NSCAD specifically) lack of green spaces, and green commons. Perhaps a space to show green art?

Artwork and the Gallery - We need to expand our idea of the gallery. *** Like the airport forcing you to go through a mall... Should we create spaces where students must pass through a "gallery space" as they go to class?

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Alternate Institutions Investigation

On Campus

What do art schools allow and don't allow... We only learn in a given setting, in a given space. We look at images on screens. Very little movement. We just sit and listen. Little interaction with the public. Little time to see the whole city. Very few field trips. We sometimes dread going to class, and spaces can become connected psychologically to that dread.

On the Bus

Every day is a field trip. More interaction with the city and the public. Better understanding of social issues, local history, and local cultures. Studio practices might be more experimental. (And might cause motion sickness). Learning in new spaces. New spaces allow for discovery and variety. Less stress perhaps. More body movement.

Who wouldn't love gesture drawings on the bus? Or figure drawings? Or quick landscape drawings when passing over the bridge. Or studying the architecture across town, and seeing the developing parts of the city... and the gentrification. Or have lectures relevant to locations. Or, have students visit the artists instead of the artists visiting the students.

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Nscad's doorways. Some lead to grand spaces, hallways, classrooms, and studios, and others lead to a place of rest and seclusion.

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FOIPOP @ NSCAD

The person to contact for information from NSCAD University is Anne Masterson  --- amasterson@nscad.ca

She provided me with the FOIPOP application form, which I must submit to her with a 5$ cheque for the application fee.

The following questions are the information I am in search of:

1. What has been the ratio of student applications to student acceptances at NSCAD University per year across the past 15 years (2003-2018)? 

2. What has been the total student population at NSCAD University per year, over the past 15 years?

3. What has been the cost of tuition at NSCAD University per year, over the past 15 years?

4.  Each year, for the past 15 years, how many NSCAD students completed a NSCAD bachelors degree? 

5. Since 2003, how many students have dropped out (i.e. have left NSCAD without completing a NSCAD bachelors degree)?

6. Each year for the past 15 years, how many NSCAD students have transferred 30+ credits from NSCAD to another institution?

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Marcel Broodthaers

Institutionalized Institutional Critique

Broodthaers was originally a poet, a struggling poet, for 20 years. He couldn’t live just off his poetry. He was known in Brussels but not hugely. At the age of 40, he began his career in art, and across the following 12 years of his career until his death in 1976, his roots in poetry stayed with him.

His use of monochromatic colour (in his early work) seems to reference his work in poetry... acts like typography, letters on a white page, the objects become words of a poem…

In his first solo exhibition, he placed unsold copies of his latest poetry book in plaster, with other materials, creating a very ugly looking piece. It shows that both hard work and beauty do not inherently merit value.

“From 1968 to 1972, he operated the Musée d’Art Moderne, Département des Aigles (Museum of Modern Art, Department of Eagles), a traveling museum dedicated not to his work as an artist but to the role of the institution itself and the function of art in society.”

Broodthaers’s museum was in a way fictive, but also very real. The artwork was the institution he created. It had postcards, pamphlets, crates, installations, etc. It also confronted the convention that historians run museums and not artists. And so the museum should be looked at as a tool rather than something that preserves objects.

His museum was scattered across Europe, sections in different places, though it began in Belgium. The museum is an idea and Broodthaers questioned what to do with the museum. He shows the idea that the museum is not made up merely of a collection of rooms and installations...

The museum’s emblem was an eagle. As a work for the Financial Section, and a means of raising money for the museum, Broodthaers produced and sold gold bars stamped with the museums emblem. The bars were sold at twice the value of the gold bar, the surcharge representing its value as art.

In 1971 the museum was posted for sale in a magazine... and was declared bankrupt in 1972.

Art doesn’t always lead to the best, society is not always something that progresses.

... Cannons and victorian decor seem very beautiful and elegant, but the same is suddenly much more aggressive and violent when seen as leisure and machine gun... 

He has done work in poetry, sculpture, painting, artists books, printmaking and film.

His works have been exhibited in the MoMA show Marcel Broodthaers: Retrospective 

Bio and work analysis:

https://www.theartstory.org/artist-broodthaers-marcel.htm

La Pluie, by Marcel Broodthaers:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ittFyj5Btw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3L6JO-U_ts8

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People Profiles - S.

Person S. is a recently graduated NSCAD student, with a major in film. Their reason for going to NSCAD was to foster their drawing and illustration skills and to get into the film industry, either with television, commercials, advertising, or filmmaking. “But I couldn’t get a job right out of NSCAD, and I feel like I’m losing those skills and things I’ve learned. I have the muscle memory and I could figure it out again most likely.”

This graduate believes NSCAD could benefit from having more connections with the commercial art world, as opposed to limiting itself to a traditional art focus. It seems to ultimately guide its students toward the traditional idea of what it means to be an artist, and largely neglects the desire and need for employment. At NSCAD, Person P. says they were surrounded by usually two types of people. Either younger/similar age, who early on would talk about NSCAD’s hay day which “makes NSCAD a reputable and good school”, but semester by semester realized much of where NSCAD falls short. The other group was of people in their late 20s and 30s, who were there to hone their skills, but knew they weren’t there for NSCAD to teach them everything for a career, more so there for enrichment and practice (in most cases). Also, “students from Dal who take courses at NSCAD don’t seem to have as much worry or care because they just take the course to learn the specific skills they are seeking for their other program.”

This student also found issues with NSCAD and budgets in the film program. Thesis films are provided about 5000$ for a film budget, and NSCAD would not cover food expenses within the budget. “We had to lie to NSCAD about why we needed extra money, we had to say it was for extra film equipment, and they were okay with that. We also said that the food was props for a shoot as well. But really it was to feed cast and crew."

They also say that NSCAD seems like it used to be much more intense and critical with accepting students. In 2005-06, Person P’s older brother applied to NSCAD three consecutive years and was denied each time. And his work and portfolio was about as good as Person P’s apparently. Yet now, NSCAD accepts many more students. The bar has been lowered greatly, and professors are generally “too soft”.

In the graduate’s words, people are too nice in critiques, not helpful, and too afraid to give feedback or appropriate criticism. Teachers who are somewhat strict, intense, or at least show they have a clear expectation are the best teachers, they really push you, in studio particularly. 

“If you’re an artist and you dread critique and are too sensitive, being an artist is perhaps not for you.”

“NSCAD dug me into this hole, and now it’s going to take me years to climb back out of it.”

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People Profiles - @.

Person @. works for the student union of NSCAD, and is also a student hoping to learn. In being a part of NSCAD, they interact with other students, vp finance, president, faculty, facilities manager, and more. Since they work with so many sides and levels within the institution, they are aware of much of its inner politics. “It makes me aware of the lack of communication on all sides, between people in the same departments, different departments, and across different job statuses.”

In their words, NSCAD's issue is that they are trying very hard to recover from the financial issues that it had, so they are focusing on their image a lot. It seems to be a collective understanding or mentality for NSCAD to branded itself, there's no one person taking care of that job.

NSCAD jumps into everything. The website (nice looking, but not functional to students or anyone), when Port Campus was built, they were expecting provincial support... Sometimes I wish I was ignorant to all the issues. Stressful knowing all of it. But I'm sometimes reassured by having access to information I'm not allowed to share.

Jim Barmby, who is in charge of the office of student experiences, said at the winter orientation “no one cares who you are at this school we only care about what you make.” While he didn’t intend for the tone of the sentence to seem so heartless and superficial, the student agrees with the statement and its negative connotation. His statement is reflected by NSCAD’s particular treatment of its established and famed alumni. The recent banners reflect this. NSCAD is holding onto what its students can produce, showing us that its values are objective and materialistic.  For a lot of people, NSCAD is essentially a starting point. It’s likely not the institution that’s going to make you known. “It's like your elementary school taking credit for the fame of their students who once went there...”

Also in their words, there's a conservative mentality where nscad's views and values are stuck in the past, in nscad's past. NSCAD has issues with letting go of what they have. In the end, they don’t think the management of NSCAD has as much an affect on the classes, or how they are taught, but it does affect the classes offered.

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People Profiles - R.

“NSCAD is not an individual, it is an institution.”

Person R. is a student at NSCAD. In their words, they are poor, studying illustration and animation, and are at NSCAD to be able to make money. They are paying to attend the school to later make money. NSCAD was the institution of choice because it is close to home, and is the dominant or only art school in town. There was nowhere's else to go; it was either here or nowhere.

“I’m surrounded by other poor students, and the occasional old person... Everything is a money grab. The world is all out to get your money. And everyone here wants money.” For Person R, NSCAD does not provide a good sense of security. In their words, it's just another place where you go to get the paper to get hired. And even then, you need the right connections.

They don’t have much to say about the institution, which in itself represents the kind of relationship they as a student have with the school. It is as if NSCAD is a bus headed for a destination it does not know how to get to, and the student got on believing the driver’s promise of reaching the destination. But the driver is lost and the student doesn’t want to get off because they already paid the bus fee...

“We are all here to use each other. Talk about how we cry at night. In class, they show you a vague example of how to do it, and the rest is self taught... No, I am not NSCAD.”

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People Profiles - W.

I am an interdisciplinary arts major, with 4 minors: illustration, drawing, animation, and art history. Because of the field of study I’m pursuing, primarily illustration and animation, the majority of people I’m surrounded by in my environment at the institution are people more focused on the commercial forms of art. Even in my drawing classes, a lot of students are also interested in producing work for commercial purposes or aspire to attain a career in that artistic field, with less interest in producing work for a gallery space. 

NSCAD seems to be hesitant in providing courses more suited to the commercial art world. You’re either a design student... or a fine art student.

What does NSCAD offer

For resources - certain classes have a fee that isn’t specified where it goes to and how it is available and what purpose it serves...

For learning - In art history, take home exams do not work. Not beneficial to the student in the end, people don’t retain that information. I did two readings in 20th Century, only because there was a question on the take home midterm and final exams. Sandra Alfoldy is an example of a good art history professor, while I didn’t do the readings, Sandra explained all of them so well that I was able to retain all the necessary information from her explanation for the exam. We were also required to do a research paper, which enables better learning by applying knowledge we’ve acquired from the lectures. 20th Century, you don’t learn anything, you don’t retain anything.Studio courses, as a learning environment, are debatable in how much you learn. For example, rules such as “never use black in painting”. Studio class learning is largely self directed. The school doesn’t really teach you much, they give you a task and you just need to do it, and you learn from doing the work. Design classes provide you with a task, but also with one or more solution. It teaches problem solving.  

The bar of expectation is set so low. And it creates a false hope. It needs to push its students more. Less babying. NSCAD is almost set up to the point where everyone can pass with little effort. You do the work, you pass. (excluding art history courses). 

“Why doesn’t Marilyn McAvoy teach any higher level classes? She was really fucking good. She was able to appreciate your work and recognize your effort and growth and give you good criticism. She was tough but good.”

“David Howard epitomizes a lot of things that are wrong with NSCAD.” He’s overly cynical, fear-mongering, and says that we are “fortunate that we don’t have people from galleries coming and looking at our work to buy it”. Almost everyone at NSCAD is here to make money. Most of us are not very wealthy. We don’t want to be poor. We want to live at least comfortably within our means. What you pay at NSCAD, you’re not receiving your money’s worth. 

NSCAD has a bias towards certain departments, such as painting...

The painting program is far more selective and confined to certain mediums. No gouache. No watercolor. The courses are structured and rigid. In contrast, courses in fields such as drawing, animation, and sculpture are far less structured, and are more diversified and open to experimental practices...

The school seems to treat drawing solely as a base point, as a fundamental for serving "higher art" rather being recognized as "high art" itself...

NSCAD students seem to be segregated by their departments...

NSCAD is both a struggling business as it is a struggling artwork...