Visual arts

The aim of Stage 4 (mandatory) Visual Arts is to familiarise students with a range of 2D and 3D art making media and skills and develop their ability to formulate ideas using specific design processes which emulate the practice of artists. Students are introduced to a variety of artists and examine the factors that affect the meaning and significance of their work and begin to appreciate that art is subject to different interpretations. Students will be introduced to the Visual Arts Key Content (practice, conceptual framework and frames) and use these tools in historical and critical investigations.

Stage 4 Visual Arts learning opportunities can include:

• The genre of Portraiture
• Approaches to Abstract Art
• Ancient Greek art and ceramics

Preliminary Course Visual Arts

Visual Arts involves students in art making, art criticism and art history. Students critically and historically investigate artworks, critics, historians and artists from Australia as well as those from other cultures, traditions and times. The Preliminary course is broadly focused, while the HSC course provides for deeper and more complex investigations. While the course builds on Visual Arts courses in Stages 4 and 5, it also caters for students with less experience in Visual Arts.

Preliminary Course learning opportunities focus on:

• The nature of practice in art making, art criticism and art history through different investigations
• The role and function of artists, artworks, the world and audiences in the art world
• The different ways the visual arts may be interpreted and how students might develop their own informed points of view
• How students may develop meaning and focus and interest in their work
• Building understandings over time through various investigations and working in different forms.

Particular course requirements:

• Artworks in at least two expressive forms and use of a process diary
• A broad investigation of ideas in art making, art criticism and art history.