Stay Home, Make Art News from the School of Art, Architecture and Design

Artist and Cass Professor Bob and Roberta Smith is setting a creative project a day for his students – and the world.

Bob and Roberta Smith, Associate Professor in Fine Art at The Cass, is setting a daily art task via his Twitter and Instagram accounts. Based on exercises/projects intended for his first year students, the artist is inviting anyone who wants to take part to join in.

The #stayin tasks to date, each accompanied by a short video clip, have invited students to translate kitchen sink noise into visual art; take a nose for a walk inspired by Gogol’s short story; map and chart their movements to better understand how they encounter ideas and landscapes; invent new words for the new experiences, share thoughts and experiences they are undergoing in the self-isolating world and exhibit their work in their windows and paint family portraits with the aim of getting to know each other. A bonus evening assignment even suggested forming a new band on Zoom.

Bob and Roberta Smith (aka Patrick Brill), whose distinctive placard artwork is synonymous with protest and debate, teaches on the Fine Art BA in The Sir John Cass School of Art, Architecture and Design. Patrick is a highly active and established artist, regularly exhibiting his work in important group and solo shows nationally and internationally. In 2013, he instigated the Art Party, a project concerned with campaigning and sharing political thought in and through contemporary art, opening up art practice and creating a vibrant visual language for political thinking and which led to a full scale Art Party Conference in Scarborough in 2014 and theatrically released film of the event.

The artist followed his acclaimed 2011 work Letter to Michael Gove (now part of the Tate collection) by standing against the Conservative MP in his Surrey constituency in the 2015 General Election. Through his art and political activity, Patrick has been a champion of arts education – an issue closely aligned with the School and University’s commitment to make art available to students from all walks of life. In 2017 he received and OBE in recognition of his services to art.

To keep up to date with the daily art tasks, follow Bob and Roberta Smith @bobandroberta on Twitter or @bobandrobertasmith on Instagram and The Sir John Cass School of Art, Architecture and Design @thecassart on Twitter or @thecassart on Instagram.

In Bob and Roberta Smith’s own words, "We are going to crush this virus with art and ingenuity."