Postgraduate Diploma in Fine Art

Purpose

The Postgraduate Diploma in Arts provides an advanced, graduate study path for artists and teachers who hold fine art Degrees and wish to upgrade their academic status, or for those who have not acquired Degree status, but who hold recognised Diplomas in aspects of the visual arts.

Rationale

The Postgraduate Diploma in Art provides training in concepts and research methods that equip the candidates with the skills necessary either for employment in the field of visual arts or for further study at Masters level in visual art.

The qualification helps meet the cultural and intellectual needs of South Africa in the important areas of visual arts practice and interpretation, and provides society with a cadre of trained visual arts practitioners.

Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL)

Non-graduates who have shown by examination or a record of appropriate training that they have reaches the required level in the discipline will be permitted to register for the Diploma.

Entry Requirements

The minimum entry requirement for this qualification is

• A Bachelor of Art in Fine Art.

N/A

1. Formulate personal approaches, at an advanced level, to complex aesthetic problems relating to, (a) basic design, pictorial and spatial elements; (b) the understanding and interpretation of past aesthetic practices, processes and technologies.
2. Competent in contemporary developments in new media, and use computer aided design packages at a high level of personal competency.
3. Competent in visualizing thought processes and enable to communicate orally and visually with visual art audiences.

Associated Assessment Criteria for Exit Level Outcome

1. Understand and manipulate qualitative and quantitative data within an area of specialisation.
2. Design and conduct research in his or her area of specialisation.
3. Produce academic papers that reflect an ability to interrogate the professional literature and engage in critical debate.
4. Articulate an understanding of an area of specialisation at the high level of abstraction.
5. Find information of professional relevance efficiently and independently.
6. Use information-technology efficiently and independently.
7. Embark on supervised postgraduate level research.
8. Independently apply discipline-based knowledge and practices to an understanding of conceptual and practical problems.
9. Design and conduct research utilizing the methods of the discipline.
10. Apply the theory and research methods of the discipline to the development of research questions.
11. Produce theoretical and research communications that draw on a range of information bases.

Integrated Assessment

Integrated Assessment of the Postgraduate Diploma in Art graduate includes measurement of foundational, reflexive and practical competencies.

Candidates are required to work under the close supervision of a supervisor appointed by the School. Consequently, a week by week assessment of the following elements is available to learners; refinement of the research proposal; compilation of an opposite bibliography; research and collation of appropriate visual referents. In addition, two formal reviews are held. In June of each year of registration, candidates are required to present their creative research results in a simulated exhibition environment. After assessment by a marking panel, candidates are appraised of the assessment and given an opportunity to explicate their creative work verbally.

In November candidates are required to submit, for examination, a body of creative work in a simulated exhibition format.