Art - Fine Art A Level
Qualification: GCE A Level in Art & Design (Fine Art)
Exam Board & Specification Code: AQA; 7242; Specification
Course Entry Requirements: 4 in Art GCSE
Please make sure that you have understood the overall entry requirements to study at BHASVIC. These are available here and outline the GCSE grades you need to take up one of the Study Programmes at the college.
Length and size of qualification: 2 year single course
Timetable hours: 4.5 hours per week
Assessment method: Practical projects supported by written work
Course charge: Our Visual Art courses include an annual fee of £95 that covers all necessary equipment and materials, including student sketchbooks and printing credits. This ensures that students have everything they need to be successful without incurring additional costs.
BHASVIC Department: Visual Arts
What will I study?
Welcome to the Visual Arts Department at BHASVIC. Fine Art is one of four subjects we offer at A-level.
The first year of Fine Art is all about discovery. We want to get to know you as quickly as possible. Initial projects are designed to encourage dialogue, a sense of play and promote curiosity. Drawing, painting, printmaking, mixed media and three-dimensional pathways will be explored. Having spent a year discovering yourselves as practising artists, much of our transition work at the end of the first-year centres around you defining your artistic selves.
In the second year you are encouraged to develop your own visual language, style and ultimately become an expert in the area you have chosen to study. A longer personal body of work gives time for this refinement and focus.
You will be taught in large, light and well-equipped studios by teachers who value you as an Artist. They will work closely with you to form supportive relationships that help guide your artistic endeavours. Many of these teachers are practising Artists' themselves. We have a fantastic team of six technicians who are also there to assist your technical needs.
Enrichment opportunities include trips, life drawing, applying to become one of our assistant curators or events assistants and a program of Artist talks.
Is this course right for me?
Are you interested in looking at the world around you? Are you open minded and prepared to make mistakes? Do you have a genuine passion and interest in the Visual Arts? Did you enjoy GCSE Art but are now ready for a new challenge in exploring new ways of recording and building an authentic artistic voice. This practical course will help you to build a portfolio of work in which written analysis and research will underpin and support the skills you develop.
Frequently asked questions
During the ‘discovery’ part of the course you will be taught skills in areas of drawing, painting, and printmaking. In February you will complete a Personal Development Project which begins to define your area of expertise, and you have more choice over the direction of study. In the second year of the course during the ‘develop’ phase, you will be working on a Personal Investigation, choosing an area of special interest to explore. Your teacher will help you to decide on a project which best fits your expertise and visual language you have established in the first year of study.
No, we explore a range of methods and techniques that encourages you to find your own style. This is backed up by research and critical understanding that allows you to develop into the style that suits you best.
You will begin the first year with a series of work which enables your teachers to get to know you better. Collaborative drawing techniques are paired with more measured studies up against easels. Drawing, painting, and printmaking are also studied. Sculpture and digital media exploration are also encouraged. We pride ourselves on our students’ range of work, from large abstracts to miniature paintings in oil, from light installations to film and animation. We want to encourage you to engage as authentically as possible in your chosen area. To see the breadth of work completed by our last cohort visit www.bhasvicvisualarts.com.
No, we do ask that you have studied Art and Design or Fine Art at GCSE as the A Level requires a level of experience and rigour that needs that foundation.
You will pay a course fee (bursaries available) that will mean that you access to a whole host of consumables and sketchbooks.
We encourage students to take an authentic approach to their Art studies. One way to do this is to visit Art galleries and exhibitions that help inspire your work. We keep an up to date ‘what’s on list’ with themes highlighted to help you choose visits that will be pertinent to your work. We organise visits to local Art foundation and degree shows. The Visual Arts department has organised many residential trips to Barcelona and are visiting Berlin with first year Visual Artists in July 2024.
Where next?
We have a supportive and structured Visual Arts career progression program to help you with your next steps into HE/FE courses. Students progress onto careers in the creative industries such as architecture, illustration, product design, web design, fashion design, photo journalism and commercial photography, film and animation. Creative careers are diverse and students may not have heard of some of the roles that they can progress to after taking a Fine Art A Level. Careers can range from a Cartoonist to an Art Valuer; from a Museum Curator to an Advertising Art Director. There are routes into many of these professions via university, art foundation and through Apprenticeships. Taking a creative course can open a range of opportunities to you and the expansion of apprenticeships means that students now have wider choice of career options available to them. Useful websites to research careers and wider progression options could include the Creative Skillset, Creative Choices, All About Careers and The Apprenticeship Guide.
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