Terrible!

Have not posted for over a month! Been over whelmed with the Foundation Art Final Major Project, and i suppose you would like to know the outcome, well, heres the letter i had to write to my parents explaining the situation!


It got to 1pm on Thursday when I realised that id got roughly 40 art pieces still left to do, and there was no way I could have finished these 40 pieces, as well as get into university and put the exhibition up by 4pm, as I also had to put the top and bottom onto the MDF unit I’d made for the art, write up an 800 word essay for my evaluation, as well as go to the library and print photos to finish my sketchbook. If I didn’t finish the final piece I would fail. If I didn’t do the evaluation I would fail, and if my sketchbook wasn’t up to scratch, which it wasn’t (not enough contextual research and writing about each piece to pass. There was no possibility of going in and requesting time as the tutors had made it clear that this work should have been finished on Wednesday 16th may, and I knew from past experience that they would have simply said ‘it’s your own fault, should have done the work sooner, or told us you were struggling sooner.’ I thought I would have enough time to finish everything so I kept on declining your help, although the nature of the work required a lot of effort from me, it wasn’t the kind of work I could have got somebody else to do.

Therefore I didn’t take the work in. I knew that it wouldn’t be enough for a pass and the work would have been an embarrassment, and everybody would see this as it would be open to public show. The tutors would have been as disappointed in me as they knew I had big ambitions and I simply couldn’t live up to them. They would have been disappointed that everyone had done the work except from me. It was upsetting me, just the thought of seeing my tutors face when I came in to display the work and seeing that I hadn’t done it, id let him down, and I didn’t want to face that. I also didn’t want to ‘tarnish’ my name by putting on a poor show, as everyone will be exposed to the failure of this project. By not taking the work in, I have simply disappeared and no longer exist on the course, which I feel is better to not exist than to show poor quality work and people look down on me as a designer.

So I decided not to take the work in. This wasn’t a rash decision. I had already decided that if I didn’t get a place on the course in September because I didn’t get a merit on this work, I was going to focus on the shop full time and pick up some more hours at work. My future plan was to do the foundation course, do the 3 year uni course to gain some more experience of how to make stuff so I could use these skills to make better stuff for the shop. After the uni course I would have then taken the shop full time, with some further experience in making various things. This way i can focus on the shop straight away, and won’t be in the struggle of balancing the uni course and the shop like I have been doing. I was only going to do the 3 year uni course for experience and to be honest, everything I know now is self taught, I was never taught to make clothes at school, I’ve taught everything myself, and you don’t get taught much on these types of art courses are they are more about personal development, it’s not like school, where I get taught stuff. And I’m not even guaranteed a job at the end of uni, so I might as well save myself the further debt of £3000 a year, not including materials and studio levy’s for the course. I’d rather save this money to invest in the shop and to aid its growth, as the shop is my only ambition in life, and I might as well do what I love right now that drag it out another 3 years. Now you may see me as a failure now, but this is what i want to do, I just want to make stuff all day and all night, and it’s a bonus to make some money out of it. So basically, I am happy with my life now, I’m not tied down doing art work I’m told to do, I’m free to make the shop my main focus, and I’m trying to get roughly 24 hours at work, just under the tax bracket so I’m not losing money to tax, and I’ll be earning enough to get myself out of debt and start saving some money so ill have savings behind me for when I need them. Eventually I hope the shop will make enough money so that I can quit working and really go full time with it, which is my main goal, but I know this could take a while, but now it is my main focus, I have plenty of time to develop, keep on top of stock and expand the shop to other places, other boutiques out of town ect, to maximise profits. So what I am doing now was what I was going to do after the 3 year degree course, just cutting out the debt of going to uni, and the stress I always put myself through when trying to finish projects. Abi Jackson (fish market) has also offered me some work experience in her studio, which is invaluable in the industry that I am in, which now I’m not tied down at uni I’ve got time to do. I wasn’t looking for a job at the end of uni, so I don’t need these qualifications. I don’t need grades to run my own business, people don’t care, qualifications mean nothing in the art / design world, its more about your work, what you do and how you do it.

I am happy with where my life is going, I’m doing what I want to do, I’m very ambitious and determined and I will make things work. You just have to give me a chance to prove that I can do this.

Of course i can :)
 
Grace Face xoxo