It’s a strange moment, looking back at the work I’ve done in the past nineteen months. I feel enormously proud of what I’ve learnt and achieved, but what is most important to me is not in the assessment criteria although it is in other courses – my personal voice. The course gives a lot of scope in exercise requirements, and I’ve found it a wonderful challenge to make choices relevant to a modern Australian textile-loving woman.
March 2013 I wrote my reasons for doing this course:
Time-management has been difficult. There is no natural ending point – there will always be more to learn, a point to research further, another comparison that would add to an analysis. Some exercises were better done than others. I tried at one point to put the main focus on the specific items that had to be sent to my tutor, but found that unsatisfying. I may have been a bit self-indulgent in the extent to which I interpreted requirements and put more emphasis on areas that particularly interested me.
In his feedback to Assignment 2 my tutor suggested I spend time thinking about what comparisons I might draw between the works studied. I’ve tried to follow that approach and feel that it has added a real richness to my study. I now have the beginnings of a framework of understanding, not just a lot of disparate bits and pieces. Seeing analogies and themes across works of different periods is fascinating.
The course worked well to introduce and build techniques in annotations and analysis. I believe I can now ask better questions, and I have built some skills and resources to allow me to start answering them. I hope I can apply this to my own work.
The OCA textiles course only allows for one optional module and I am so very glad I chose this one.
congrats Judy, sounds like a resounding success. glad you got so much out of the class