Contributor’s Corner: Goldsmiths – from the inside

Blog written by Boidus Contributor – Sam Hill

You may – depending upon your background – know a little or a lot about Goldsmiths College. Chances are you’ve heard of the contentious Fine Art course (now based in Will Alsop’s ‘squiggle’) that spawned Damien Hirst, Marcus Harvey and most of the other YBA’s in the nineties. You might also know about the sterling BA Design course, which is where I graduated in 2008.

Of course, if you are interested in the BA or MA courses on offer at Goldsmiths, all the information you would ever need to know about the college is online but I’ll try and deliver an impassioned, recent-graduates perspective.

Goldsmiths College is not perfect, but it is pretty bloody brilliant. Deep in the grubby arse of south-east London (between Deptford, Lewisham and Peckham), it’s exactly the right breeding ground for experimentation, invention, fusion and raw, frontier culture. That’s not to say that the place is intimidating. Honestly, it’s not. It was the general un-stuffiness that led me (and plenty of my contemporaries) to choose the BA course over many of London’s other successful design institutions.

Photo from Sam Hill

Anyone who’s been to Goldsmiths will tell you, tongue-in-cheek, about it’s reputation. To mirror this, in 2007 I co-founded So Fucking Goldsmiths with Stuart Bannocks: a self-satirical view of campus life at an “arts” college – the Facebook group is still ticking over here.

The BA Design course lasts 3 years and does not focus on any specific discipline. This means it’s not for everyone. If you’re confident you just want to make chairs for a living then don’t apply. If however, you are prepared to adopt the ethos of the course (which I will now attempt to explain, as I interpret it) then studying can be a very rewarding experience.

The first lesson is: you are on the course to learn how to learn. That is to say, although there is a range of assistive workshops, tutorials and contextual studies, the onus is on the student to develop a working practice that will then ensure they have the capability to learn further skills independently, as and when they need them. Self-motivation is essential. The term was never used, but you might think of this as a primer in ‘future-proofing’ yourself.

Secondly, work is process-led. The most valuable outcome of a project is rarely the final object itself. Do not expect to see too many shiny, bevel-edged products at a Goldsmiths degree show. There is a strong expectation to explore ideas laterally, and exhaustively. The tutors like to see a lot of mock-ups, prototypes and experiments.

Finally, the strength and integrity of ideas is very important. A contextual understanding is critical, and so is work that promotes discourse. A lot of consideration needs to be had on the purpose, function, and necessity of design; the benefit to the user, as well as society in general. This means a good studio culture is important, and students need to be able to cooperate with each other and articulate their thoughts clearly to do well.

It may be shamless self-promotion, but my work is a somewhat typical example of the course output. This is my final degree project, an exploration into the value of taking risks.

I would also definitely check out the design department’s blog, also, click here for Goldsmiths photostream on Flickr.