Art foundation portfolios

[GlamGiraffe]

My son is compiling his portfolio to present to the art schools he has applied to.
His school give no suggestions.
His work is largely conceptual and involves a lot of his own clothing which he designs from the initial fabrics, makes the patterns himself and then creates the tailoring etc as well as life size sculptures (which lurk in my house to scare me at night🙄)
He does some life drawing and paintings which are couple with aroma sprays(?) Apparently to enhance the experience 🤔. I cant work put how this can be captured on paper.
Has anyone any suggestions or experience how ot might be best to condense the ket stages in images (and what are the vital elements) for the portfolio please .
Thanks

I think your son should have done a lot more research himself on what’s required and his art teacher should be advising too. He’s lucky he hasn’t needed the portfolio before now. DD had to present hers at interviews in early February when she applied for a degree and had worked on it for weeks before that! So when he applied for a degree be aware of that.

However I suggest you look at the web site of The University of the Arts, London. (UAL) I have attached the relevant page for you but there is a pdf to download. This is general info but when students are interviewed they should be able to talk about their art, what inspired them, what experimental work was undertaken and how the finished piece evolved.

I’m assuming he might want a fashion degree after so UAL is a great place to look at what they require for their degrees. Foundation courses are less demanding in terms of portfolio.

It’s vital it fits in a portfolio case. Take photos of bigger pieces. DDs clothes were part of a fashion show and photos of her clothes were included in the portfolio.

@BubblesBuddy
Thanks, yes we have the UAL page and the foundation application was recently his schol advised all students to apply at the, end of the application process which seems odd. They have advised the same for all art courses.
We are both just finding it hard to establish how to give the best impression.
He was offered an unconditional place on a london art degree after someone saw his work but its not the degree he wants. I think the world must have potential but its conveying it on paper. It's hard without guidance.

When my dd applied for Foundation, each college was explicit about how many pieces, what size, what subject matter etc.
I'm surprised your institutions haven't.

For the clothing designs, does he do mood boards/sketches too? If so, I would pair these with high resolution large photographs of the outfits, including some close ups of details labelled to explain particular techniques/ideas.

Life drawings, seems straightforward enough to just neatly mount these onto a neutral background.

Large paintings: high quality photographs, eg using a tripod, photoshopped to check levels. Printed as large as possible (eg at a print shop, not to A4 please). Label with title, date, medium and dimensions of actual work. Could include note: painting to be experienced with scent of “....”. Unless there’s any way the scent could be put on a small fabric swatch and that included?

Make sure you use the same colour for background throughout whole portfolio, I’d recommend a dark grey. All labels same typeface and size. Organise into sections, drawings, paintings, fashion.
It sounds like your son is very creative, you just need to make his work as visible as possible within the portfolio and not let it become chaotic (the work can need to be the focus and can be as mad as you like, but a messy portfolio will detract from it).

Good luck!

The UAL advice is good as is the advice above. He must present it logically, neatly and in such a way the assessors can actually look at it easily. They don’t want huge pieces of work dragged in or pages and pages of unfocused work. Use photos snd follow the tips from UAL.

Did he need to do a foundation? DD went straight to degree. What degree does he want?

He doesnt know @BubblesBuddy, that's why he wants to fo the foundation. He was offered a degree. He created very unusual clothing and has done outfits for tv but was unblinking onto an A0 canvas hes painted, collages with a communist theme...slight discrepancy! Hes undecided.

Inkinkg not unblinking. My auto correct sucks!

Also remember that when hes presenting his portfolio he will be there to talk the interview through it and talk about his inspirations/what worked/didn't work/ would he change anything. Often they are much more interested in the.
process than the finished article and showing your critical thinking through development.

I'd split the portfolio into separate projects to show the working of each final piece. For the ones that smell could he attach a piece of scented fabric in a bag he could show the interviewer?

Dont over simplify to make it look clean but focus on showing skills and showing how he came to his final pieces. The one thing most interviewers hate at this stage is asking where you got an idea from and they reply being "it's the first thing I thought of" especially if he wants to go down a design route.

Out of interests, where has he applied to?

Some advice I was given at 17 on a short course at an art school was to make my portfolio reflect me and my interests, not show a range of skills/what you think they want to see. Even if that means a portfolio full of drawings of cliffs, or whatever: it has to be true to you, so you can defend it and discuss it passionately and sincerely at interview and in crits when at college.

That was the opposite of what my art teacher thought (he was pushing for heavy focus in life drawing, which I now know from my BA, MFA and doing some teaching at art school, would not have piqued anyone’s interest. I mean, some is fine, but you know what I Mean!). this was advice for Fine Art, not Foundation, though.

A foundation is a great idea if he’s not certain what he wants to do. He should look up the degree shows of some top schools. I would say that there are now more performative/not traditional fine artists doing really well in the contemporary art world, that may interest him and show that Fine Art doesn’t necessarily mean having to focus on painting rather than costume. Eg Zadie Xa.

Foundations are excellent for artists to develop, and I’d always recommend them, although I personally went straight to BA as was certain as to which area I wanted to work in.

He should apply to the Menwear degree at Central SM, as of all the art students in dd's year, those were the people who have 'gone furthest'. She's only 23! But a good tip for a slightly lesser known course.

Not that lesser known! It’s CSM! I do think a narrow focus isn’t the right advice. Take advice from the best universities for his field. LCF or CSM would be great and it is a foundation art course so they won’t expect the greatest portfolio. As long as it’s coherent, ordered, the assessors can make sense of it and view it, he will be fine. Yes he needs to be able to discuss it and it definitely needs to show progression from sketches to finished work (useful for fashion).

He will need to make sure the art foundation will help with his artistic development. There is also costume for stage and screen courses so look at these too.