Cass Foundation Summer Show 2019 News from the School of Art, Architecture and Design

Annual exhibition of student work promises to surprise, delight and break new ground and includes roof top structures.

Date: 24 May 2019

The Cass foundation show 2019, taking place at Calcutta House from the 24 to 31 May will showcase work by students on the school's four foundation year courses including an ambitious project to create a roof garden structure. 

About the Foundation Show 

By Chi Roberts, Principal Lecturer, Head of Cass Foundation, and Senior Lecturer on the Foundation Course

The Foundation Course continues to push at the boundaries of expectation for student work at this level; the range of media and methods, and the issues addressed, are always a surprise and delight but this year the ambition and achievement break new ground.

The Film, Photography and Media students have made animations, image-based installations and the film ‘MenTality’ - a London Met TV special investigating the state of men’s minds today by Foundation students for Mental Health Awareness Week.

Students across from across the Foundation course including Fashion and Textiles and Art and Design presented ideas for ‘An Imaginary Event’ to the Accelerator, the University’s specialist social entrepreneurship and business incubator. The events ranged from conventional exhibitions in unconventional places, to flash-mobs to enliven mundane spaces and dramatic protests to politicise places addressing issues such as poverty, climate change, disability rights and gender-stereotyping.

The Architecture Interior Design (AID) students have taken over the roof garden at the Aldgate campus once more with a reinterpretation of the shading structures. The students created and presented a wide range of individual ideas and then voted to select the final designs that would be developed and completed by groups as an ensemble piece. This is essentially a live-project commissioned by the Cass and funded this year by sponsors Dales Fabrications Ltd and support from East London Architecture Group and Jesmonite. It is a valuable experience for architecture and interior design students at the very start of their careers.

The Art, Media, Design (AMD) students will be presenting their final projects and these often relate to the creative practice they will be studying at BA level next year at the Cass; though not always! Sometimes it’s simply a particular material they like to work with or they have the ambition to nail a technique or explore the methods of a particular studio or workshop. This means that the paintings, sculptures, animations, films, photographs, models, drawings, prints, textiles, dresses, costumes, patterns, graphic design and many other outcomes cut across the boundaries of the standard creative subjects and hint at new possibilities for their future study and further ahead to their future careers.

The Cass has developed its research relationship with The DisOrdinary Architecture Project to co-explore how we can open up the multitude of different ways of being-in-the-world to students, both as a potential design generator and as a key part of personal development. DisOrdinary is a platform bringing together disabled artists and built environment/design students, educators and practitioners for creative dialogue and action; identity and diversity are understood as complex but vital aspects of design making; with projects aiming to help foundation-level students creatively and critically engage with their own and others' multiple identities.

The Foundation show opens at Calcutta House on Friday 24 May between 5-7pm CM3-14, CM3-15 and the Roof Garden. The show spaces are open from 2-9pm each day until the show closes on Friday 31 May.