Starting in the '23-'24 Academic Year, the Students' Union will officially be running a series of Non-Academic Shows! These are exhibitions of student work, curated by students, on campus. The shows are not part of any academic programme, but they support students to get hands-on experience curating and presenting their work, allow you to meet and work with students from across the college, and play a key role in making this place feel like the vibrant, creative art school that it is.
Applications for Term 2 non academic shows will open 15th November! The deadline will be 8th January at 5pm. The following spaces/dates will be available:
Kensington
The Upper Gulbenkian: 18-22 March 2024
Hockney Gallery: 19-23 February 2024
Battersea
The Hangar Gallery: 8-12 March 2024
Application Pack
Application Form
* * *
Between March and June 2023 the Students’ Union supported four trial Non-Academic Shows, after working extensively with the college to create an MOU that would enable these shows to go ahead. The shows brought little-used college spaces to life, and offered extracurricular curatorial and/or exhibition opportunities to 50 students across the college, a number that will grow in the '23/'24 cycle. Students from all four schools took part, across 15 programmes. These shows were incredibly well received by staff, students and visitors alike. Between all four shows, we estimate that we had nearly a thousand visitors in total. Below are some images of and information about the shows.
Unfolding Traces, Pigeon Park
Hangar, Battersea, 29-31 March.
Included students from MA Painting, MA Print, MA Ceramics and Glass, MA Sculpture, and MA Contemporary Art Practice.
Unfolding Traces is a new student-led pop-up initiative that will work collaboratively with artists from the Sculpture, Painting, CAP, Print, Ceramics & Glass MA Programmes at the RCA to produce a show in the Hangar at RCA Battersea. Unfolding Traces explores questions surrounding hybrid identities and future worlding manifested through the magic of collective thinking.
Unfolding Traces is produced under the umbrella of the RCA-based curatorial collective Pigeon Park.
BRINK, 2030 Collective
Hangar, Battersea, 22-24 May.
Included students from MA Sculpture, MA IED, MA Print, MA Digital Design, MA Textiles, MA Painting, SoA PhD, MA Photography, MA Environmental Architecture, MA Jewellery and Metal, MA Contemporary Art Practice.
Artists today are envisioning a plurality of new worldviews. Brink, a group exhibition from 2030 Collective, seeks the emergence of futures we all wish to live in. The curatorial premise of Brink, begins from the assumption that art, with its ability to address our precarious present and make meaning from it, can lead to a deeper understanding of the environmental challenges that we face.
The term "brink" refers to the sense of being at a crucial or critical point, beyond which success or catastrophe may occur. It suggests a state of uncertainty, where the outcome of a situation is in the balance, and where even small actions or decisions can have a significant impact on the future.
Legacy, SustainLab
Hockney Gallery, Kensington, 24-30 May
Included students from MA Textiles, MA Ceramics and Glass, MA Service Design, MA Painting, MA Contemporary Art Practice, and MA Fashion.
SustainLab is a collaborative platform for all RCA students to explore what sustainability is and how it can be progressed. It is a middle ground for ideas to be challenged, investigated, experimented, and shared. We organise events, workshops and biweekly open-crits for students to develop their knowledge of sustainability and how to incorporate it into their creative processes.
Semantics of Love, Danuser & Ramírez
Hangar, Battersea, 26 May to 1 June
Included students from SoAH PhD, MA Sculpture, MA Painting, MA Fashion, and MA Contemporary Art Practice.
What is the love ethic required to facilitate a nurturing relationship with our (shadow) selves, others and the planet?
«Semantics of Love» is a trans-disciplinary group exhibition that functions as a point of exploration for potential answers.
Evading the sisyphean task of answering this question, the curators propose an assortment of antitheses, sketches, ideas, and references that discuss above mentioned relationships. The result is a microcosm of “love ethics” in RCA’s hangar space.
