BLOCK 1:
12th of September to 18th of October, 2023
A typical week
Foundation Program (Year 1)
Theme: Only the Necessary
Every week we expose the student to different currents in Recent Art History. This class is obligatory for students on the Foundation program and open to all students. It is necessary to have passed this class to access the 2nd Year of Metàfora’s Studio Arts Program. This class gives the students a grounding in the most influential themes in contemporary art since 1945.
Only the Necessary (Recent Art History, Diana Padrón)
In this block we will pay attention to how Minimalism and the conceptual art movement of the 1960s and 1970s completely transformed our understanding of space and materials. Based primarily in New York, the artists involved started creating objects out of raw materials that consisted of basic geometric forms. The goal was to eliminate any kind of reference to the outside world in order to create works that referred only to themselves. For the conceptual artists, this meant that the idea itself could be the work of art. Artists: Frank Stella, Kenneth Nolan, Agnes Martin, Mary Corse, Carl André, Anne Truitt, Richard Serra, Donald Judd, Dan Flavin, James Turrell. When referring to Anti-Form or Post-minimalist works, we will take a close loo at the work of artists such as Eva Hesse or Lynda Benglis as well as: Giovanni Anselmo, Jannis Kounellis, Michelangelo Pistoletto, Mario Merz, Josef Kosuth, Robert Barry, Yoko Ono, Lawrence Weiner, Art & Language, Jirí Kovanda, Jenny Holzer amongst others.
At the end of the block students are asked to complete small test to demonstrate their knowledge on the material exposed. This class is obligatory for all Foundation students, and for Certificate and Diploma students who did not complete them during their first year.
Thinking and Making Workshop: Sculpture
During every Block students on the Foundation Program have a compulsory workshop which helps students answer conceptual questions materially and material questions conceptually, so as to encourage them not to see a divide between art theory and art practice.
Sculpture: Only the Necessary (Marc Larré)
The main purpose of the class is to give students tips to understand the relationship between resources and results in the production of an artwork. We will look at examples of impactful results with very few resources and the other way around. Only the necessary will help us to chart the strength of sparseness.
Certificate / Diploma (Years 2-3)
Critical Theory: The Use of Semiotics for the Understanding of Visual Art
This class introduces students to the theory, philosophers and thinkers that have been, and are still, the most influential on contemporary art, aesthetics and visual culture.
The Use of Semiotics for the Understanding of Visual Art (Rubén Verdú)
One of the ways to crack the mechanics of communication is to analyze the inner works of the sign. Wait… communication? Why should we care? If anything, art is, above all, the manipulation of the sign, we could even say that art is the manipulation of the sign to the most extreme. The study
of meaning-making is at the core of all this. We are going to venture ourselves into how this works, into the multifaceted mechanics of semiotics and its entrapments, especially its entrapments, because at the end, as you will see, it is the entrapments that we love to delve in.
WRKSHP: Four Paintings and a Virginal
A practical class that ensures students are challenged and exposed to new methodologies even when they are in the 2nd or 3rd Year of the Studio Arts Program.
Four Paintings and a Virginal (Michael Lawton)
In this class students will be asked to answer a weekly question by making paintings, thinking about what it can be used for, and what it can’t; when is painting an appropriate medium to work with? If the answer is always, then what does it sound like when we speak in painting?
À-Lab: Make MACBA Yours
During the first block we will make the most out of our collaboration with Barcelona’s Contemporary Art Museum, MACBA. Every we go there to explore the collection in under the title “Make MACBA Yours”.
Open to all students, but obligatory to all 2nd and 3rd year students.
Tools & Techniques
for all students (years 1, 2-3)
Land Art
Schedule Thursdays 27 April, 4, 11 and 18 May between 9:30-13:00
Land Art
Schedule Thursdays 27 April, 4, 11 and 18 May between 9:30-13:00
Land Art
Schedule Thursdays 27 April, 4, 11 and 18 May between 9:30-13:00
Land Art
Schedule Thursdays 27 April, 4, 11 and 18 May between 9:30-13:00
BLOCK 3:
16th of January to 22nd of February 2023
Specific classes,
Foundation Program (Year 1)
Theme: The Ground on Which We Stand
Every week we expose the student to different currents in Recent Art History. This class is obligatory for students on the Foundation program and open to all students. It is necessary to have passed this class to access the 2nd Year of Metàfora’s Studio Arts Program. This class gives the students a grounding in the most influential themes in contemporary art since 1945.
The Ground on Which We Stand (Recent Art History, Diana Padrón)
During this block we think about site-specificity, or not. About where we are, what is happening there, what is happening to the whole planet perhaps.
The ground on which we stand is changing because of what we as a species have done to it.
But also, (politically speaking), where does this land stop and another begin. Who decides that?
Can an artwork be specific to where we are now, and intended to be shown in a specific place, that
tells me a story of ours, whilst also reflecting on what it is like to be living now, and so people from anywhere can appreciate it, whilst still feeling local?
At the end of the block students are asked to complete small test to demonstrate their knowledge on the material exposed. This class is obligatory for all Foundation students, and for Certificate and Diploma students who did not complete them during their first year.
Thinking and Making Workshop: Site-Specific Installation
During every Block students on the Foundation Program have a compulsory workshop which helps students answer conceptual questions materially and material questions conceptually, so as to encourage them not to see a divide between art theory and art practice.
Site-Specific Installation (Anna Irina Russell)
Specific classes,
Certificate / Diploma (Years 2-3)
Critical Theory: Queer Theory
This class introduces students to the theory, philosophers and thinkers that have been, and are still, the most influential on contemporary art, aesthetics and visual culture.
Queer Theory (Helen Torres)
During this class, we will discuss some foundational concepts of queer theory (Judith Butler, P. Preciado, J. E. Muñoz) and put it in dialogue with some art practice and our own artwork.
WRKSHP: The creative side of Lo-Fi media
A practical class that ensures students are challenged and exposed to new methodologies even when they are in the 2nd or 3rd Year of the Studio Arts Program.
The creative side of Lo-Fi media (Agustín Ortiz Herrera)
Not only do we live in the era of mass media consumption, but we have already entered that of mass media self-production. In this context, as artists, we are presented with the possibility of using the means that we have at our disposal in a creative manner, but also in a conscientious way.
In this course we are going to experiment with the production of audiovisual projects that have some connection with your creative process. The idea is to use the most basic means that we have at our disposal: smart-phones with camera, video and sound recorder and a simple editing software. Artworks by some artists such as Maya Deren, Chris Marker or Bruce Conner will serve as inspiration while some basic recording and editing exercises are proposed that include, among others, using online found footage, distorted sounds and superimposition of still photos.
This project oriented course can be focused on any of the particular interests from each student and meanwhile the creation is developed we will work on the awareness of the artistic investigation process driven through the moving image and emphasizing as well processes of conceptualization, experimentation and production. At the end of the course the projects will be presented online.
À-Lab: Career and Presentations
Tools & Techniques
for all students (years 1, 2-3)
BLOCK 4:
6th of March to the 19th of April 2023
Specific classes,
Foundation Program (Year 1)
Theme: The Trivial and the Meaningful
Every week we expose the student to different currents in Recent Art History. This class is obligatory for students on the Foundation program and open to all students. It is necessary to have passed this class to access the 2nd Year of Metàfora’s Studio Arts Program. This class gives the students a grounding in the most influential themes in contemporary art since 1945.
The Trivial and the Meaningful (Recent Art History, Diana Padrón)
This block examines the explosion of the mass media and its expression in Pop art and those movements that relate to and derive from the consumer’s society emerging in the mid and late 20th c. as well as the Information Age and Postmodernism.
At the end of the block students are asked to complete small test to demonstrate their knowledge on the material exposed. This class is obligatory for all Foundation students, and for Certificate and Diploma students who did not complete them during their first year.
Thinking and Making Workshop: Assemblage
During every Block students on the Foundation Program have a compulsory workshop which helps students answer conceptual questions materially and material questions conceptually, so as to encourage them not to see a divide between art theory and art practice.
Assemblage (Martí Anson)
Specific classes,
Certificate / Diploma (Years 2-3)
Critical Theory: Optopia
This class introduces students to the theory, philosophers and thinkers that have been, and are still, the most influential on contemporary art, aesthetics and visual culture.
Optopia. The Evolutionary Stages of Visuality (Rubén Verdú)
What role will the image play in a future that is increasingly determined to overcome the limitations of the human species? What promotes and motivates the prolific mediation of screens? Why this type of mediation and not another? Any answer to these questions draws, right from the start, a scenario of possible futures that will have a great impact on all those disciplines that give the visual phenomenon a central position in their practices. It is crucial, therefore, to understand the processes that leads us to privilege everything that stimulates the eye and, of course, to understand why it is so configured and not otherwise.
WRKSHP: Interference
A practical class that ensures students are challenged and exposed to new methodologies even when they are in the 2nd or 3rd Year of the Studio Arts Program.
Interference (Martí Anson)
À-Lab: Link Seminar
Link Seminar (Laura Llaneli)
Once a week we have a class which is dedicated to getting to know the local art scene, while at the same time helping students to develop and refine their artistic discourse: talking about art and getting to know local and no-so-local artists.
Open to all students, but obligatory to all 2nd and 3rd year students.
Tools & Techniques
for all students (years 1, 2-3)
Painting Self Portraits
Paint in oil and acrylics layers using various techniques such as transparent and opaque acrylic, over-painting, painting monochromatic studies, using colour backgrounds, stencils and masks, on different supports including paper, canvas, wood, metal, transparent plastic in small size.
Introduction to Metal Work
This class teaches students the exciting melting and joining process of the ARC welding. Be familiar with electrode rods, the power station and its three wires, and with grinding and polishing machines. Students practice of the starting spark, running a weld bead, cleaning and polishing the joint. Naturally, the class includes security systems and personal health protection while welding by making a small metal sculpture.
Introduction to Stop Motion
In this eye-opening workshop students learn how to use Stop Motion to produce artistic projects. We look into early cinema, the uses of stop motion in contemporary art and also, why not, advertisement. With basic equipment, like mobile phones, we discover apps and software available to make our lives easier. At a later point students work with Premiere or iMovie to produce projects more professionally.
Other Techniques: Drawing
for all students (years 1, 2-3)
Drawing Gesture and Movement
A gesture is an action that has significance: the gift of bunch of flowers, or the movement of the pencil on the sheet of paper. Drawing gesture is the action of the hand and drawing tool as they follow the movement of the eye while it scans the figure.
The activity of looking is selective and goal-directed: the eye darts over the field of vision, seeking and selecting pertinent features in the field, and dovetailing these with the mind’s means of making sense of them.
Gestural drawing is one that follows the eye’s search for meaning; it should be quick, seeing and placing the whole figure almost at once.
Life Drawing
These classes form “the basics” for understanding model drawing: construction of the body, anatomy, composition, body expression. Over the academic year this class is a weekly ongoing event, and Piotr makes the most of this different dynamics to help students to develop their own expression and language in drawing.
BLOCK 5:
24th of April to the 7th of June 2023
Specific classes,
Foundation Program (Year 1)
Theme: Body and Limits
Every week we expose the student to different currents in Recent Art History. This class is obligatory for students on the Foundation program and open to all students. It is necessary to have passed this class to access the 2nd Year of Metàfora’s Studio Arts Program. This class gives the students a grounding in the most influential themes in contemporary art since 1945.
Body and Limits (Recent Art History, Diana Padrón)
This block aims to give an introduction to Performance and Body Art practices mostly characterized by their rejection of a clear narrative, the use of chance-based structures, and direct appeal to the audience altogether challenging the conventional values of more traditional art forms.
At the end of the block students are asked to complete small test to demonstrate their knowledge on the material exposed. This class is obligatory for all Foundation students, and for Certificate and Diploma students who did not complete them during their first year.
Thinking and Making Workshop: Performance
During every Block students on the Foundation Program have a compulsory workshop which helps students answer conceptual questions materially and material questions conceptually, so as to encourage them not to see a divide between art theory and art practice.
Performance (Laura Llaneli)
One of the most popular classes, this workshop is taught by artist and in-house tutor Laura Llaneli. In this module students are encouraged to experiment with the body in all its facets: through examples of artist who work with time, space and context, students test their own and others limits.
Specific classes,
Certificate / Diploma (Years 2-3)
Critical Theory: Diffractive Pedagogies & New Imaginaries
This class introduces students to the theory, philosophers and thinkers that have been, and are still, the most influential on contemporary art, aesthetics and visual culture.
Diffractive Pedagogies & New Imaginaries (Helen Torres)
An introduction to the thinking of, (amongst others), Karen Barad, Lynn Randoplh, Donna Haraway and Iris van der Tuin.
WRKSHP: Artist Books
A practical class that ensures students are challenged and exposed to new methodologies even when they are in the 2nd or 3rd Year of the Studio Arts Program.
Artist Books (Anna Pahissa)
À-Lab: Make MACBA Yours
Once a week we have a class which is dedicated to getting to know the local art scene, while at the same time helping students to develop and refine their artistic discourse: talking about art and getting to know local and no-so-local artists.
Open to all students, but obligatory to all 2nd and 3rd year students.
Make MACBA Yours (Marc Larré)
One of the most important missions of an art school like Metàfora is to show its students not only to make art, to talk about art and to reflect on it. It is central that, as promoters of contemporary art, we sometimes pull the students out of the studios and present them with the contemporary context, the art scene.
As part of our studio arts program, we organize periodical visits to the temporary art exhibitions and the permanent collection, but also a more direct activity which we have baptized “Make MACBA Yours”.
Tools & Techniques
for all students (years 1, 2-3)
Abstraction and Scale
How to create an abstract painting with deep personal and aesthetic idea? How can a scale of the painting change its perception and why?
During these workshops Piotr Perski will give a historical background and basic tips and rules related to abstract painting. He will will start each painting day with a discussion of a painting and then a demonstration of how that painting is done along with thoughts, theories and ideas that are behind its execution.
Students are invited to create abstract pictures from the personal aesthetic idea and philosophical or literature interests in big scale format with previous analysis of micro and macroscopic pictures of a nature or cosmic space.
Land Art
Oriol Texidor, in-house tutor and the artist who will be giving this workshop often works in land art, amongst other things.During these sessions he will explain what land art is and guide the students to create their own artwork.
Land art, variously known as Earth art, environmental art, and Earthworks, is an art movement that emerged in the 1960s and 1970s. As a trend, “land art” expanded boundaries of art by the materials used and the siting of the works. The materials used were often the materials of the Earth, including the soil, rocks, vegetation, and water found on-site, and the sites of the works were often distant from population centers.
Screen Printing
In this workshop students learn the whole process for a screen printing edition, from preparing the photolith, coating the screen, exposing it to the light, developing, registering the support and printing. We will print on paper but also on different supports such as canvas, t-shirts, wood, glass or metal. Advanced students will learn the CMYK technique! Usually we end up with a “Printing Market Exchange” among all the participants.
Other Techniques: Drawing
for all students (years 1, 2-3)
Drawing Portraits
During these workshop, Piotr Perski will teach portraiture (basic structure), parts of the face , lines and emotions, natural expression , likeness in a half-length portrait.
He will show students how to create a series of group portraits or family portraits working with unusual materials such as old photos, tracing paper, paper plates and napkins. The portraits can depict not only the physical realistic aspects of the model, but can also integrate personal feelings, senses, and attributes.
Life Drawing
These classes form “the basics” for understanding model drawing: construction of the body, anatomy, composition, body expression. Over the academic year this class is a weekly ongoing event, and Piotr makes the most of this different dynamics to help students to develop their own expression and language in drawing.