Camberwell College of Arts

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Camberwell College of Arts
Established: 1898
Location: London, United Kingdom
Campus: Camberwell
Affiliations: University of the Arts London
Website: www.camberwell.arts.ac.uk

Camberwell College of Arts (formerly known as Camberwell School of Art and Crafts) is a constituent college of the University of the Arts London. It is located in Camberwell, South London with two sites situated at Peckham Road and Wilson Road. It offers further and higher education programs, including postgraduate and PhD awards. The College runs Art and Design Courses, and uniquely in London has retained single degree options within Fine Art, offering specialist Bachelor of Arts courses in Painting, Sculpture, Photography, Ceramics and Drawing. The college also runs graduate and postgraduate courses in art conservation.

Contents

[edit] History

The College's history is finely intertwined with that of the South London Gallery, with which the college shares a building. Manager of the South London Working Men's College in 1868, William Rossiter, purchased the freehold of Portland House on which the College now stands in 1889. The resulting Gallery opened in 1891, followed by the Technical Institute, the College's first guise in 1898. The philanthropist John Passmore Edwards gave a substantial sum of money for the erection of the building in memory of Lord Leighton. The school and gallery were the fruition of a movement for the foundation of an artistic centre in Camberwell, supported by Edward Burne-Jones, Lord Leighton, Walter Crane and G F Watts. The College aimed 'to give the best artistic and technical education to all classes in the district'. Originally the College offered classes in particular crafts (such as architecture, cabinet design, embroidery, wood carving, wood block and stencil cutting), and by 1920 a Fine Art Department had been created.

During World War II Victor Pasmore was appointed to a post in the school's Painting Department and he in turn brought in William Coldstream and Claude Rogers. It was the influence of these three eminent Euston Road School painters which saw an exciting period for the art school and its association with figurative painting. Many well known artist's like Frank Auerbach, Lawrence Gowing and Edward Ardizzone taught at Camberwell during this period. The prominent abstract painter Robert Medley was Head of Fine Art in the 1960s and he in turn brought Ron Kitaj, Kenneth Martin, Patrick Proctor and Euan Uglow to teach at the college. During this period the College had a thriving Art History Department which employed painters such as Harold Cohen and academics like T. J. Clark (historian). Paul de Monchaux was Head of Sculpture & Fine Art at Camberwell from 1965-86, and it was during this period, in 1973, that the College expanded into a modern purpose built block next to its old premises. Both sites are Listed buildings.

In the 1980s Wendy Smith became Head of Fine Art and employed Noel Forster, John Hilliard, Cornelia Parker and Ian McKeever. Camberwell School of Arts and Crafts became a constituent College of the London Institute in 1986, formed by the Inner London Education Authority to associate London's art, design, fashion and media schools into a collegiate structure. The school was renamed Camberwell College of Arts in 1989. During this restructuring Camberwell temporarily lost its Fine Art courses but by the time The London Institute was granted University status and was renamed University of the Arts London in 2004, Fine Art had been restored to the College.

At Camberwell, students are taught by teachers that are highly regarded in the art world, such as artists Richard Slee, Matt Franks, Brian Griffiths, Saskia Olde Wolbers, David Cross of Cornford & Cross, Daniel Sturgis, and Hew Locke.

[edit] Research

Research projects at the college relate to a number of ongoing theoretical and practical debates in areas such as the interface of new technologies and creative practice; transnational art, identity and nation, and the conservation of Byzantine books and manuscripts. Camberwell is part of the University of the Arts London and its Research Network (RNUAL), which also includes Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design, Chelsea College of Art and Design, London College of Communication and London College of Fashion.

Camberwell also has a number of prominent artists acting as researchers and lecturers such as the painters Humphrey Ocean and John Keane (artist) and the ceramicist Julian Stair. With strong links to the local community, Camberwell is setting up an exhibition space, Peckham Space designed by Will Alsop in Peckham Square, and oversees in partnership with the Arts Council of England the current scholarly research into John Latham (artist), whose local residence has recently been turned into a museum.

[edit] Affiliations

Camberwell is part of the University of the Arts London and together with its sister colleges Chelsea College of Art and Design and Wimbledon College of Art makes up C.C.W., a three college model which allows each College to retains its own individual identity whilst allowing students to access teaching and learning across the University. Other University of the Arts Colleges are Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design, London College of Communication, London College of Fashion.

Internationally the College has links to other European art schools and Universities, and students regulalry taking part on ERASMUS educational exchanges to institutions in Marseille, Leipzig, Milan and Madrid.

[edit] Notable Alumni

[edit] Notable Non-alumni

[edit] References

* Camberwell School of Arts & Crafts : its students & teachers, 1943-1960 by Geoff Hassell. Published by Antique Collectors' Club, Woodbridge, Suffolk, 1995. ISBN 1-85149-180-5.

[edit] External links

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