What you see around you is the triumphant display of work of our Graphic Design finalists.
I remember how hard these students worked when we did the Penguin Books covers together in their first year, and how fresh their ideas were. Since then, we’ve worked together through many projects: multimedia animations and posters, World Cup Football stamps, placements, original books, BBC radio projects and experimental typography.
The students rounded up their portfolios with an extended set of demanding and competitive briefs, along with their dissertations. This year, these embraced an absorbing range of topics from the apparently intractable politics of the EU to the apparently inexorable appeal of pets, from the changing certainties of skeuomorphism to the consistent caprices of trends, from the minutiae of punctuation to the militarism of chocolate, the exoneration of packaging and the beguiling lure of particular colours. These are just a few examples, and in these and all the other equally stimulating topics the students have stayed up to the minute and mined relevance in relation to their practice and skirted round the minefields of obvious originality.
These students are charming and personable, friendly and accommodating: witness how they welcomed back the students who had taken a study year abroad, and the students who joined direct into this final year. Witness, too, their fluent contact with the professionals in the field with whom they have worked. It’s a group full of enthusiastic and entertaining individuals, attentive and moving on fast.
The Degree Show is always poignant because it laces the pride we feel for the students with the sadness of parting. These have been a delight to teach, truly a year group to light up a dark winter morning, and the staff and the rest of the University are blessed and richer for all the days we’ve spent with them.
The Degree Show would not take place without the efforts and talents of the students themselves, who are divided into groups with specific tasks to make it happen – it clearly worked. Some gave sponsorship funds iCandi Apps, Culturae Mundi, The big fish, Roger Bailey Consulting and Shire foods truly generous: thank you. Many other individuals also played vital parts – Joanna Ornowska in the Print Bureau; Mark Buttree, Pete Hnatuschka and Charles Chan, Jason Terry and Ray Pearson with digital support; Keith Holmes, Carl Williams, Paul Bryan, Craig Browning and Rob May with technical help.
We would like to thank all of you as well as the students, friends, parents and partners who have supported our students throughout their time at Coventry University.