Collaborative Hybrid Course

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Course Example

Katie Ries' Special Topics in Illustration

Content of the Class

An in-depth study of an artistic issue of special interest. ART 389 may focus on one or more art forms, an artistic movement or comparison of movements, or a theme. Students are challenged to evaluate trends in historical and contemporary art production as it relates to their own art making.

ENGAGEMENT

Community of Learners

Students communicate with each other about their work through Slack, and have in-person critiques at the end of each project. Most of their interactions as a class occur online in Slack, allowing students to dive deeper into the critique of one another.

TECHNOLOGY

Slack

This course relies on Slack to communicate as a class. This allows students to analyze and critique others work outside of class and have a more in-depth discussion in the classroom. All of their finished projects are posted to the class website.

Teaser Video

Complete Discussion

Professor

KATIE RIES

Student

MADDIE LEBRUN

Coursework Examples

Surface Design

Now we’ll focus on maintaining a similar level of production towards a single product: the repeating pattern. You’ll create original imagery, arrange and color it to produce a repeating unit, and then repeat and apply that unit to create believable mock-ups. Please work with the software with which you are most comfortable: there are two videos demonstrating creating patterns with Illustrator or Photoshop.

The Project Description can be found here

“Cross Feather” by Emma May

Read their blog post here

“Stationary Design” by Carla Davila

Read their blog post here

“Hero Pattern” by Lindsay Kropp

Read their blog post here

Editorial

We’ll be working with Anne Helen Peterson’s article, “How Millennials Became The Burnout Generation” published earlier this year on Buzzfeed. You’ll create a “front page” illustration as well as a series of six (6) roughs, drawn to scale, for proposed complimentary illustrations for the rest of the article.

Your illustration will be the “featured image” for the piece. That’s the one that is shown on Twitter, Facebook, and other digital platforms when someone shares the article. It should relate strongly to the article, but it is not necessary to literally illustrate or show specific content. In fact, the Getty Images published with the original article are a great example of this. They suggest rather than specify.

The Project Description can be found here

“Burnout from Womb To Tomb” by Katie Hopkins

Read their blog post here

“Millennials- Burnout Generation” by Carla Davila

Read their blog post here

“Keep Working” by Emma May

Read their blog post here

Final Project

As we wrap up the semester, I’d like you all to use this project to do two things: 1) to create a piece that lets you make the work you’d like to make and 2) to assemble your illustration portfolio as a page (and downloadable PDF if you’d like) on your website. When we spoke with Sam Smith he said something like, “Your portfolio should be about getting the work you want to do in front of the people who can hire you to do it.” To that end, your final project should be aligned with your dream job. What would you love to be hired to illustrate? For whom? 

The Project Description can be found here

“St. Norbert Sticker Sheet” by Maddie Lebrun

Read their blog post here

“Headspace Redesign” by Katie Hopkins

Read their blog post here

“Magnolia Spring Launch-Pattern Design” by Julia Allen

Read their blog post here