Qiaoer Jin, MA Fine Art, Chelsea College of Arts has been selected for the AER residency at the Chinese Centre for Contemporary Art, Manchester

Screen shot, Half Flame Half Brine by Qiaoer Jin, a single-channel video that consists of found footages and animations

Set up by Professor Lucy Orta UAL Chair of Art for the Environment – Centre for Sustainable Fashion in 2015, The Art for the Environment International Artist Residency Programme (AER) provides UAL graduates with the exceptional opportunity to apply for short residencies at one of our internationally renowned host institutions, to explore concerns that define the 21st century – biodiversity, environmental sustainability, social economy, and human rights. Through research, studio practice, critiques and mentoring the AER programme is designed to envision a world of tomorrow; to imagine and create work that challenges how we interact with the environment and each other.

Read Qiaoer Jin’s successful residency proposal:

I recently graduated from the University of Toronto’s Visual Studies and architectural design program, and currently pursuing a master degree of fine arts in UAL. I primarily work with time-based media such as video and sound installation. Through my art practice, I keep paying attention on the relationship between human being and nature/environment. My artworks reveal my concern about how human being interact with nature and impact their surrounding environment. Most of my works critic on environmental issues such as light pollution, sound pollution, air pollution and excessive usage of energy resources. Recently, I am exploring with fictional storytelling regarding the topic of post-humanism.

by Brian O’Callaghan, MA Fine Art, CSM

Frida Kahlo with Olmec figurine, 1939. Photograph by Nickolas Muray

Frida: Inside and Outside at the Lydia & Manfred Gorvy Lecture theatre was a recent conference exploring the work and legacy of Mexican Artist Frida Kahlo (1907–1954). The event saw a host of practitioners and academics unpack how Kahlo’s art expressed a reappraisal of Mexico’s indigenous heritage, and Kahlo’s fashion as resistance, in respect of her lived experience of disability.

We know the artist as an enormous character who casts her shadow through popular culture in the same way as Che Guevara, or Warhol. From fancy dress parody to fashion shoots, commercial ’Fridamania’ can at times threaten to obscure the work of this complex and unconventional artist.  The Frida we meet over this engaging 2 day conference is a multi – layered and nuanced woman. Like peeling away the over paint on an ancient fresco, the distinguished scholars and speakers unlock the doors to a new Frida, seen through the gender political mood of her era and its wider culture. 

by Sara Kelly, MA Textiles, Chelsea College of Arts

Frida Kahlo: Making Her Self Up, V&A 2018

In the summer of 2018, the Victoria and Albert Museum opened its doors and welcomed the public to the extraordinary exhibition ‘Frida Kahlo: Making Her Self Up’.

Frida Kahlo is celebrated as one of the most significant artists of the 20^th century.  She was a unique and rebellious Mexican painter, known for her extraordinary life, as much as her artwork. Over 60 years after her death, Kahlo has become a cult figure, appropriated by feminists, artists, phycologists and fashion designers alike.

We are delighted to announce our new team of Post-Grad Community Ambassadors. With a student from each college, our Post-Grad Ambassadors are your point of contact at your college. They will be organising their own events, open to all postgrad students across UAL and helping us to deliver and document other Post-Grad Community acitivty including Pop Up Common Rooms and Mixers.

Get in touch with the ambassadors if you have an idea for an event or activity you would like to see the Post-Grad Community deliver, or if you simply want to say hello and find out how you can get involved.