A sculpture based on Arts University Bournemouth (AUB)'s prospectus, House of Cards, has been unveiled at this year's Arts By The Sea Festival.
During this year’s UCAS fairs and Open Days, AUB invited school children and prospective students everywhere to build their own inventions, using the unique prospectus' collection of cards, which are designed to slot together. The winning design, came from the then-Year 12 Art and Photography A-Level students from Queen Elizabeth’s School (QE) in Wimborne.
The team of 13 QE students fought off stiff competition from across the UK by people of all ages who entered via the AUB Instagram channel to have their designs built into a larger-than-life version of the cards.
The sculpture, unveiled on Friday 27 September, is a supersized version of the QE students’ design, reaching a height of over four metres and featuring 26 cards from the House of Cards prospectus deck slotted together. The one-square-metre cards are replicas of the originals with eye-catching images of the different courses, complete with working QR codes that take people direct to the corresponding course pages.
“We have some time at the beginning of each lesson for ‘Do now tasks’," explains Alice Saville, art technician at QE. "It was during one of these sessions that we introduced them to the cards.
"I’m actually an alumna from AUB – I studied for my degree in Commercial Photography there – so when I saw this competition, I really wanted our students to have a go. I didn’t give them any rules or guidelines, and it was lovely to see that they naturally chose to collaborate and helped each other build rather than working independently.
“We’d recently studied some architecture-related projects, so I think that definitely came into play when they were thinking about structure, and at the end of the session, we had two final designs, one from our Art A-Level students and another from our Photography A-Level students.
The impressive sculpture celebrates the launch of AUB Academy, the University’s selection of short courses that are open to anyone, as Pete McKinley, Short Courses Manager at AUB, explains:
“We’re thrilled to announce the launch of AUB Academy with this incredible sculpture. That it’s created by 13 local teenagers couldn’t be more fitting for the launch; AUB Academy is all about inviting the local community in to work with us, and this is the perfect representation of that.
“By opening up the University and its first-rate resources to the public, we’re inviting and encouraging anyone who wants to explore art and design subjects to come and do just that. We’re passionate about making creativity as inclusive and accessible as possible, it’s at the very core of what we do here at AUB.”
AUB Academy is fully open to the public and includes evening and weekend courses for adults as well as Summer Courses and a Saturday Art School for young people aged seven to 18. All the short courses take place on the AUB campus making use of the industry-standard software, studios, and equipment providing the very best educational experience.
Lisa Mann, Acting Vice-Chancellor at AUB, adds, “We’d like to say a big thank you to the 13 students from QE who designed this amazing and collaborative sculpture for the launch of our new AUB Academy. Following its debut here at Arts by the Sea, the sculpture will take pride of place in our courtyard on campus, and we welcome everyone to come and see it for themselves, it really is very impressive!”
Continuing their collaborative theme, the students from QE comment as a whole: “We are really excited to have been given the opportunity to exhibit our work at the Arts by the Sea festival. We had a fantastic time working as a team to invent this sculpture and we’re grateful to AUB for the chance to contribute to this amazing festival, to the artistic community, and for us, it’s also great for our UCAS applications!”
