Final year students at the Royal Academy Schools recently held an exhibition to show their unique artworks, several of which were inspired and created using Epson large format printers and projectors.
The on-site Epson Digital Suite, housed within the Schools’ historic studio spaces, provides students with the opportunity to experiment and create their unique pieces with the very latest Epson digital imaging technology available.
The longest-running independent art school in Britain, the RA Schools is the only art school to offer a three year postgraduate fine art course charging no fees. The final year exhibition provides visitors with a rare chance to view exceptional pieces by a new generation of artists in an historic venue. The finished artworks span a range of media from painting to photography, sculpture, digital print and film.
All 17 students worked with Epson technology at some time during their three years at the Schools and it featured strongly in several students’ work at the show this year:
Elliot Dodd: whose work stretches from 3D computer design, sculpture, drawing, print and sound. It is through his experimentation with various technologies that he has been able to develop his work. His Ice Cream Man pieces were produced using digitally-printed steel sheets. These stood alongside works produced in the Epson studio that manifested as film and sculptural-based objects.
Gery Georgieva: who works primarily in video, performance and installation. Her multi-media digital video installations Isolabella L’Aquarimosa, Ghlain Klain and Tingle Continuum were shown using Epson projectors in an immersive theatrical environment that bombarded the senses with multiphrenic visual layering.
Anna Hughes: who creates both two- and three-dimensional compositions using paintings, found materials and sculptural objects. Her The Guild piece included digital print on cotton, building upon previous researches into the uses of digital print technologies and the possibilities that technology offers.
Molly Palmer: who showed her idiosyncratic multi-screen narrative films using Epson projectors to create a surreal mash-up installation combining choreographic dance, dramatic costuming and theatrical artifice, offset with an aural background of original music and spoken word.
Anna Paterson: whose Leafs series of works featured collaged layers of combined digital and traditional print forms on paper and printed aluminium substrates. The resulting works are deceptive minimal abstractions of modulating colours and subtle shifts of material choice.
Clare Undy: whose Shoes and Mime comic video performances were shown using Epson projectors. These were presented both as live and recorded performances, one of which used a digital print poster stack to create a live interactive film throughout the show experience, where the gift of a free unique digital print collectively resulted in a stop-frame animation video loop akin to a real-world flick book.
Mark Hampson, Head of Materials Process, RA Schools, says: “The ways in which our students interpret, abuse and interact with the possibilities of digital technologies never ceases to surprise me. They are both accepting and suspicious of new technologies and are enviably adept at the manipulation of them as raw materials.
“Often as artists they utilise digital technology against its expected commercial functions and this creates hybrid, surprising and creative artistic consequences. As our students travel on these often illogical and idiosyncratic research journeys and investigations Epson have continuously supported us, offering the latest equipment, advice, encouragement and knowledge with their complete trust and approval. This collaborative response is unique within the worlds of art and industry and we are grateful that Epson offers us the opportunity to embrace the potentials of new digital mediums. In doing so, they have helped us evolve as a twenty-first century art school of much-admired and acknowledged contemporary status.’’
