Northern Ireland
Between 2007-2009, Sylvia led the MA in interdisciplinary arts at Queen’s University Belfast, and taught her students how to be able to inscribe their artworks with both associative tiers of contextual and conceptual information. Through her experiences of living and working in Northern Ireland - Sylvia started to relationally explore imaging and culture ideas around survelliance, optics, semantics of language and land use.
As MA Convener of Photography and Visual Arts at Queen’s University Belfast Sylvia's responsibilities were four-fold 1) to lecture on contemporary digital photo imaging and popular cultural arts (from photography [fine art, photo montage and digital composite] to zines, blogs, interactive performance art, graphic novels, illustration, and gaming) in relation to the their past and current development. 2) to direct a fine art photography and visual arts curatorial writing program as part of on-going student development and studies and 3) to teach within the applied visual media arts programs course modules in digital studio (composition, imaging, and e-publishing) and 4) to promote research and the University by continuing to publish, exhibit, and undertake international dialogue about the delivery of photography and media arts across interdisciplinary platforms.
In addition while at Queen's University Belfast (QUB) Sylvia worked with artist and curator Keith Donnelly (Glasgow), and Sinead Morrissey (Seamus Heaney Centre Poet) to deliver a new graduate streamed program to explore the construction of linguistic and creative artworks that transverse design and cultural media production. As part of this work, she delivered a showcase exhibition, re-COLLECT-ing, of 18 student artists’ and writers’ work in their response to Queen's special collections as part of the university's centenary celebrations. This program of work was accompanied by a catalogue with contributions from both guests and participants associated with the graduate and exhibition programme. The catalogue was published by Queen’s University Belfast and the Naughton Gallery (ISBN 9780853899341; p 56)
The Picture-Text program was listed as supporting initiative for the University’s bid to win the Times Higher Award for Innovation in the Arts. Work from this curatorial programme developed by Sylvia and her students went onto win as part of QUB's submission for the Times Higher Award for Art and Innovation in 2008. This award would parallel a prize being offered by the General Governor of Canada for exceptional arts practice delivery in higher education. To present, Sylvia remains engaged with colleagues in Northern Ireland across the photographic and literay arts.
Projects produced in Northern Ireland 2008-2012 include
COMING TO THE TABLE
ORCHARDS
Between 2007-2009, Sylvia led the MA in interdisciplinary arts at Queen’s University Belfast, and taught her students how to be able to inscribe their artworks with both associative tiers of contextual and conceptual information. Through her experiences of living and working in Northern Ireland - Sylvia started to relationally explore imaging and culture ideas around survelliance, optics, semantics of language and land use.
As MA Convener of Photography and Visual Arts at Queen’s University Belfast Sylvia's responsibilities were four-fold 1) to lecture on contemporary digital photo imaging and popular cultural arts (from photography [fine art, photo montage and digital composite] to zines, blogs, interactive performance art, graphic novels, illustration, and gaming) in relation to the their past and current development. 2) to direct a fine art photography and visual arts curatorial writing program as part of on-going student development and studies and 3) to teach within the applied visual media arts programs course modules in digital studio (composition, imaging, and e-publishing) and 4) to promote research and the University by continuing to publish, exhibit, and undertake international dialogue about the delivery of photography and media arts across interdisciplinary platforms.
In addition while at Queen's University Belfast (QUB) Sylvia worked with artist and curator Keith Donnelly (Glasgow), and Sinead Morrissey (Seamus Heaney Centre Poet) to deliver a new graduate streamed program to explore the construction of linguistic and creative artworks that transverse design and cultural media production. As part of this work, she delivered a showcase exhibition, re-COLLECT-ing, of 18 student artists’ and writers’ work in their response to Queen's special collections as part of the university's centenary celebrations. This program of work was accompanied by a catalogue with contributions from both guests and participants associated with the graduate and exhibition programme. The catalogue was published by Queen’s University Belfast and the Naughton Gallery (ISBN 9780853899341; p 56)
The Picture-Text program was listed as supporting initiative for the University’s bid to win the Times Higher Award for Innovation in the Arts. Work from this curatorial programme developed by Sylvia and her students went onto win as part of QUB's submission for the Times Higher Award for Art and Innovation in 2008. This award would parallel a prize being offered by the General Governor of Canada for exceptional arts practice delivery in higher education. To present, Sylvia remains engaged with colleagues in Northern Ireland across the photographic and literay arts.
Projects produced in Northern Ireland 2008-2012 include
COMING TO THE TABLE
ORCHARDS