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Crafts students showcase their work at MAKING IT 2023
Tuesday, 14 March, 2023 — Alumni Bonnie Mustoe-Whitehill, Harry Chadwick and Gail Stubbs are showing their pieces at the bi-annual craft exhibition
<p dir="ltr">Alumni from Arts University Plymouth’s <a href="https://www.aup.ac.uk/courses/undergraduate/ba-hons-craft-material-practices">BA (Hons) Craft & Material Practices</a> course are exhibiting their work at <a href="https://makesouthwest.org.uk/all-exhibitions/making-it-2023" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">MAKING IT 2023</a>, the South West’s leading showcase for emerging artists, makers and designers. Alumni Bonnie Mustoe-Whitehill, Gail Stubbs and Harry Chadwick are showing their work until 18 March. </p>
<p dir="ltr">Making It is held every two years, celebrating innovation, diversity and collaboration in craft and making. The exhibition sees 16 emerging talents showing in the prestigious Jubilee Gallery at <a href="https://www.crafts.org.uk/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">MAKE Southwest</a>, Bovey Tracey. MAKE Southwest, in partnership with <a href="http://designnation.co.uk/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Design-Nation</a>, <a href="https://www.findamaker.co.uk/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Find A Maker</a> Craft Festival, <a href="https://www.qest.org.uk/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">QEST</a> and <a href="https://www.plymouth.ac.uk/research/sustainability-hub-low-carbon-devon" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Low Carbon Devon</a>, invited applications from makers who were within five years of graduating or setting up a creative business and are a resident of the Southwest.</p>
<p dir="ltr"><a href="https://www.harrychadwickart.co.uk/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Harry Chadwick</a> is a sculptural artist, working predominantly in metal and glass. Graduating from BA (Hons) Craft & Material Practices in 2022 with a First Class Honours, Harry welds, folds and forms metal into colourful tool-like sculptures which encapsulate glass, be it sheet, blown or cast. Since graduating, he has been Runner Up in the Contemporary Glass Society’s New Graduate Review and he also received the <a href="https://www.aup.ac.uk/posts/arts-university-plymouth-alumni-showcased-at-british-glass-biennale-2022">Glass Sellers Student Award at the 2022 British Glass Biennale</a> with his cast glass pieces ‘The Drowning of Handcraft’. His works are often produced to pose a question, sometimes serious, sometimes less so, from the viewer, and he endeavours to bring people together through conversation.<br /></p>
Harry Chadwick receiving his Glass Sellers Student Award at the 2022 British Glass Biennale
<p dir="ltr">Harry said, “I showed a selection of pieces from my body of work ‘Pop Futurism’, along with some new pieces. The origin of my work stems from my former life as an engineer and the use of hand tools during my apprenticeship. There is an ever expanding desire now to turn to new technology to produce artwork, which I am also guilty of. However, I do acknowledge that hand tools played a huge part in my journey to where I am now and these pieces pay homage to some of those tools.”<br /></p>
Harry's work on display at Making It 2023
<p dir="ltr">“There were several briefs to choose from for applying to Making It, but I found a sustainable link, as I use waste glass in my pieces in order to reduce my carbon footprint. I was lucky enough to be one of 16 artists selected from over 70 applicants, alongside my two classmates Bonnie and Gail.”</p>
<p dir="ltr"><a href="https://www.bonniemustoewhitehill.com/">Bonnie Mustoe-Whitehill</a> is a mixed media artist, who graduated from BA (Hons) Craft & Material Practices in 2022 with a First Class Honours. Curious about the psychology of touch and play, this guides her interest in creating tactile objects for the benefit of the user, whether this is visual, mental or physical. Living alongside nature, in the Cotswolds, Devon and Cornwall, has inspired her to use natural tactile forms as starting points for her work. Bonnie won the Runner-Up prize of £500 for New Designer of the Year for her work ‘Complete Collection of Tactile Objects’ at 2022’s New Designers.<br /></p>
Bonnie Mustoe-Whitehill
<p dir="ltr">Bonnie said, “I briefly met a couple of representatives from Make Southwest at New Designers in the summer. In September, they messaged me on Instagram, saying they strongly encouraged me to apply as they loved my work. I applied and I got in!”<br /><br />“The body of work I’ve shown is from my final major project, the same body of work that was exhibited first at New Designers, then at Aspects Gallery in Portsmouth and now at Making it in Bovey Tracey. I attended the private viewing the day before Making It opened, and it was really nice to mingle with the other artists. Making It really offers a lot for the exhibitors, we were given tickets to a learning day, which includes talks and workshops and also a mentoring scheme, so I’m really looking forward to that.”<br /></p>
'Please Touch' by Bonnie Mustoe-Whitehill
<p dir="ltr">Also appearing at Making It, Gail Stubbs was a part-time student on the BA (Hons) Craft & Material Practices course at Arts University Plymouth who graduated in 2022. She is a designer-making using the opportunities afforded by ceramics and print to produce a body of work that responds to large scale industrial fishing. Gail is also a seaside pub owner and as a consequence has a strong relationship and informed understanding of fishing from sea to plate. Replication of an original factory-made plate provides a canvas to display subtle distorted imagery alongside maritime phrases to encourage discussion and contemplation surrounding food politics and fishing practices. As well as being exhibited, some of the plates are used in her seaside pub, where fish and chips are the main seller, inviting consumers to ponder the processes involved in providing their meal.<br /></p>
Gail Stubbs
<p dir="ltr"><a href="https://www.aup.ac.uk/people/gayle-matthias">Gayle Matthias</a>, Senior Lecturer and Subject Leader for <a href="https://www.aup.ac.uk/courses/undergraduate/ba-hons-craft-material-practices">BA (Hons) Craft & Material Practices</a> said, “Making It highlights imaginative, contemporary and innovative approaches to craft practice, qualities that we advocate on our Craft and Material Practices course. Bonnie, Harry and Gail’s work looked great in the gallery, their work displays originality in material choices and narrative content.”<br /></p>
Gail's pub plates
<p dir="ltr"><a href="https://www.aup.ac.uk/courses/undergraduate/ba-hons-craft-material-practices">BA (Hons) Craft and Materials Practices</a> allows students to explore the art of traditional making alongside the rapid digital prototyping facilities in our Fab Lab, focused around providing the resources to reinvent craft for the 21st century through the use of state-of-the-art facilities dedicated to glass, ceramics, metals and wood alongside new and innovative creative techniques and materials to encourage creative and inventive thinking and making. To find out what it’s like to be involved in a creative community, visit <a href="http://www.aup.ac.uk/">www.aup.ac.uk</a> or attend the next on campus <a href="https://www.aup.ac.uk/open-days">Open Day</a>.<br /></p>
