Photography in the Post-Digital era is a dynamic, inter-disciplinary practice with rich histories, diverse identities and evolving dimensions. At the Wolverhampton School of Art, we explore these diverse legacies through a synergy between contemporary practice, critical theory, and professional contexts (Live Briefs, internships, and graduate awards with leading organisations in the Creative Industries such as Kodak and Multistory).
The BA Photography course is taught by internationally exhibiting specialists in portraiture, performance, landscape, phototherapy, archives, and the everyday. You will work alongside staff and other professionals to become self-motivated and critically-aware of the developing careers within contemporary photographic practice. Live projects and off-site shows provide additional professional experiences and networking opportunities whilst considering the audience, appropriate publication and future employment.
During your degree, you will work in our exceptional darkrooms (black and white, colour), digital scanning and editing suites, a digital printmaking facility, and spacious, purpose-built studios that are all supported by subject-specific technical specialists. We provide all photographic equipment – from cameras to darkrooms and lighting kit – in order to facilitate the successful production of your work throughout the course.
What happens on the course?
The BA (Hons) Photography is distinctive in its approach because you will:
You will be assessed on 100% coursework
Contribute to a creative student culture
Share and collaborate your ideas and practice within an Art School
Work with staff who are published, exhibited and knowledgeable
Undertake contemporary and live assignments
Publish work
Have open access to professional darkrooms and digital facilities - check them out here
Create personal and professional portfolios using our industry standard studios and equipment
The course structure offers the freedom and support to explore, challenge and interrogate established photographic genres that will allow you to engage and promote your ideas through a number of key assignments. Whilst examining creative methods and conceptual planning, you will form the basis of your critically engaged practice. Simultaneously these conceptual ideas, contextual knowledge and understanding are the essence of live industry briefs and external projects that you will engage with as part of the development of your professional portfolio.
Professional Development
Studio and workshop culture is core to our courses and you will be encouraged to become part of the art and design community through time spent working in the studios, workshops and labs available to students across the week. Our contacts with galleries, curators, publishers and editors offer the opportunity for you to work on live projects. As a result, individual student development is enriched through valuable professional experience and the production of a specialist portfolio - both necessary in the competitive and demanding professional world.
All courses in the School of Art are now available with a professional placement (sandwich year) option. A professional placement provides an opportunity for professional development in the workplace, and greatly enhances the student’s prospects of finding rewarding and relevant employment at the end of their studies.
Level 4
You will be introduced to the key themes, media, and methods of the BA Photography Programme through a number of practical assignments. You will be encouraged to begin thinking independently about the selection and choice of theme, ideas and processes employed in your assignments whilst receiving instruction in the photography workshops and equipment. Assignments will allow you to produce portfolios of images about identities and place.
Level 5
You will initiate self negotiated projects and materials as you begin to define your practice as a photographer and image-maker in professional contexts. You will be supported in developing independent thinking about the selection and choice of theme, ideas and approaches employed in your projects whilst receiving advanced supervision in the photography workshops and equipment. You will create work that is outward facing, has an audience and is published.
Level 6
You will manage the production of projects as you define your practice within the Creative industries. Specific audiences and modes of publication will drive your selection of themes, development of ideas, and refinement of specialist methods and media. Live briefs and public facing assignments will allow you to produce portfolios of images that promote your professional skills in contemporary formats: exhibition, dissemination, and publication.
Advanced Workshops
Exhibition by Fine Art & Photography students Wolverhampton School of Art
Workshops are a major part of the learning experience at the Wolverhampton School of Art, stretching an understanding of practical skills whilst coming into contact with material, cultural, social, historical and contemporary issues.
This exhibition brings together work produced by BA (Hons) Fine Art, BA (Hons) Photography and MA Fine Art students who took part in an Advanced Workshop programme of their choice between September 2020 - May 2021.
Wolverhampton School of Art Graduate Showcase 2021
We are delighted to announce our end of year graduate showcase highlighting the work of our final year students in Art, Design and Screen based subjects.
We are delighted to announce that the Wolverhampton School of Art has been selected as one of the venues for the prestigious British Art Show 9! In what is a major boost and sign of recognition for arts and culture in Wolverhampton, we are proud to be hosting this prestigious touring exhibition in January 2022 along with Wolverhampton Art Gallery.
For more information about our facilities click here.
For more information about Illustration at Wolverhampton, please follow us on Instagram.
Wolverhampton School of Art
For more information about the Wolverhampton School of Art: visit our home page.
Discover more about our outstanding facilities – visit our facilities pages.
Learn about the creative industries and everything we do to help our students to achieve the career of their dreams on our Creative Enterprise page.
Our Creative Futures talks, led by professionals working in the creative industries, provide encouragement and insight to make your creative career a reality.
Check out the work of our 2021 graduating students on our Degree Show and MA Show pages.
Find out what our students say – view testimonies from successful graduates on our Case Studies page.
This module provides you with the time and space to develop independently by supporting you to become more experimental in the production of your work. The emphasis, in this module, is on process, theory, and practice and the ways by which they contribute to the production of your work. Throughout the module you will be encouraged to test new approaches and ideas and to reflect on the successes and importantly, the failures of your work. In tutorials and group reviews you will be asked to reflect on these experiences and to consider how you might learn from experimentation, critical analysis, and the feedback of potential audiences to re-think and re-work your ideas. This module will also introduce you to a range of dialogues between models of practice and contextual knowledge that will help you understand contemporary practice, and its relationship to audience. You will engage in lectures and seminars and produce a range of creative and academic contextual assignments that will directly link to your projects. The module will encourage you to organise your time effectively, work more independently and demonstrate the personal curiosity to find and evaluate concepts and artworks that have a specific relationship to your work.
Module:4FP017
Credits:60
Period:1
Type:Core
Locations:Wolverhampton City Campus
This module introduces you to a range of workshops, resources and staff working across the School of Art to provide you with specialist making, methods and media instruction appropriate to your practice. It is an intensive workshop-based module and throughout the year you will undertake a series of studio, workshop and media-based projects that will provide the foundation for your emerging practice. As a Level 4 student in the School of Art you will be supported to make the leap between your prior educational experiences and independent practice. You will develop time management skills through structured tasks and increasingly you will be expected to make use of independent study hours to further test and progress your work in the studios and workshops. In this module you will also learn to document and record your work effectively and gain confidence in reflecting on your work in sketchbooks, journals, group reviews and tutorials in relation to a range of contextual ideas, practitioners, and projects associated with your work.
Module:5FP015
Credits:60
Period:2
Type:Core
Locations:Wolverhampton City Campus
This module is designed to increase your awareness of a variety of concepts, issues and strategies of display, which have affected or influenced the way in which creative practitioners devise and develop work. You will stretch and deepen your application of practical skills and conceptual thinking to examine the role of a wider audience both within our facilities and through engagement with external sites and organisations. A programme of advanced tutor-led workshops and contextual research will support you to develop appropriate tools for the realisation and dissemination of your work and related projects. Additionally, you will examine the importance of context for creating and controlling meaning within a framework that your practice is located in. Through ongoing contact and exposure to material, cultural, social, environmental, historical and contemporary issues within the arts you will demonstrate the critical ability to site your work professionally in public contexts.
Module:5FP014
Credits:60
Period:2
Type:Core
Locations:Wolverhampton City Campus
As a Level 5 student in the School of Art you will be supported to make the leap between your prior Level 4 experiences and advanced practice and techniques. You will further develop time management skills to make use of independent study hours to further test and progress your work in our facilities. In this module you will develop more personal methodologies to document and record your work effectively. You will gain confidence in reflecting on your work in sketchbooks, journals, group reviews and tutorials in relation to a range of contextual ideas and artists associated with self-initiated work. Through tutor led lectures and seminars, the module will present a range of contextual and conceptual frameworks, and practices to support the development of your independent work. You are expected to apply advanced methods of experimentation in order to realise, review, test and discuss contemporary practice, your work and the work of your peers. You will generate practical and written responses to underpin your conceptual and aesthetic position. As level 5 progresses you will be expected to advance through a body of work and pose significant ideas for progression at level 6.
Module:6FP011
Credits:60
Period:3
Type:Core
Locations:Wolverhampton City Campus
As a Level 6 student in the School of Art you will build on your previous experiences and advance your practice and techniques. Through a focused and on-going enquiry, you will establish a sustained ability to reflect and develop work, based on an informed understanding of your practice. This module aims to strengthen the development of a sustained and independent artistic practice leading to the completion of a significant body of work. By encouraging you to explore a range of concepts and practices, you will consolidate your skills through critical enquiry and be expected to make full use of facilities, studios and your personal study hours. Specialist tutorials will support you to identify, understand and reflect on the connections between intention, process, outcome and context in your work. The dissertation project will equip you with critical and theoretical languages drawn from contextual frameworks relevant to your practice.
Module:6FP012
Credits:60
Period:3
Type:Core
Locations:Wolverhampton City Campus
This module will enable you to resolve your work to a professional standard and address appropriate personal and career objectives, in order to develop new strategies for intervening and disseminating your work in the public sphere. You will explore a range of concepts and practices of contemporary strategies of display, dissemination, promotion and publication leading to the completion and exhibition of a significant body of work This module will offer you opportunities to demonstrate and expand on the practical, critical and contextual dimensions of your practice and present it through a variety of platforms. You will engage in contemporary display strategies through planning, production, presentation and the evaluation of curatorial practices and exhibitions. You will focus on professional ways of situating your practice in a specialized context and work towards professional opportunities and collaborations with key cultural institutions in the industry and sector. As a Level 6 student in the School of Art you will build on your previous experiences and progress your work towards external audiences. You will focus your organisational and logistical skills through independent enquiry and be expected to make use of your personal study hours.
PotentialCareer Paths
Employability is core to the ethos of the School of Art’s learning and teaching, and BA (Hons) Photography provides opportunities from Level 4 onwards to experience and engage with professional and industrial contacts. At Level 4 students are encouraged to encounter and experience all aspects of their specialist area and further embed themselves into the subject through visits and speakers. At Level 5 students will have the opportunity to experience professional practice and will work on subject-specific briefs led by external clients/organisations. At this level there will also be an emphasis on off-site/live projects/placements that offer opportunities for interdisciplinary collaborative practice. Level 5 is designed to give students the opportunity to risk take and experiment within their subjects but also to meet and network with other students across the School of Art. Level 6 emphasises self-negotiated projects and provides students with the time and support to develop their individual voices as artists and designers. There is also provision for interdisciplinary teams working together on ambitious final outcomes where appropriate, and students will be supported to maintain placement learning and external networks established at Level 5. In addition, the University offers a Career Development Week each year, which is intended to provide cross-curricula activities that enable students to extend or galvanise their skill and employability goals.
Additional Information
Everything you need to know about this course!
The School of Art houses a range of purpose-built studio spaces and workshops with an extensive range of professional equipment not available in schools and colleges. Students at the School of Art are taught by practicing artists and designers working in academic and technical roles. These specialist practitioners teach both fundamental skills, support experimental and speculative practice and ensure practice is underpinned by knowledge and awareness of contemporary contexts.
The course is taught by internationally exhibiting specialists in portraiture, performance, landscape, phototherapy, personal identities, archives – stories and narratives and the everyday. You will work alongside staff and other professionals to become self-motivated and critically-aware of the developing careers within contemporary photographic practice. Live projects and off-site shows provide additional professional experiences and networking opportunities whilst considering the audience, appropriate publication and future employment.
During your degree, you will work in our exceptional darkrooms (black and white, colour), digital scanning and editing suites, a digital printmaking facility, and spacious, purpose-built studios that are all supported by subject-specific technical specialists. We provide all photographic equipment – from cameras to darkrooms and lighting kit – in order to facilitate the successful production of your work throughout the course.
The BA (Hons) Photography in particular is distinctive in its approach because you will:
Contribute to a creative student culture
Share and collaborate your ideas and practice within an Art School
Work with staff who are published, exhibited and knowledgeable
Undertake contemporary and live assignments
Publish work
Have open access to professional darkrooms and digital facilities - check them out here
Create personal and professional portfolios using our industry standard studios and equipment
The Photography course provides you with all the necessary skills that enable you to thrive in the exciting and fast-moving creative industries. Typical employment for our alumni includes work as magazine editors, exhibiting photographers, artists and curators, freelance studio and fashion photographers, editorial and documentary photographers including sport and those who work in the broader industries of publishing, museums and galleries, community artists, curators and educators. These diverse career paths are introduced to you through a number of ‘live’/professional projects giving invaluable professional experiences and real assignments during study. A number of our students opt for further study either at Masters level or study for a PGCE and these individuals are seeking to develop their skills in practices such as arts and health, art curatorial practices and other Masters degrees by research.
All of our students have the opportunity to engage with an additional ‘Employability Award’ associated with their degree, and a high percentage of our students achieve the gold standard.
All courses in the School of Art are now available with a professional placement option (Sandwich Year). A professional placement provides an opportunity for professional development in the workplace and as such, greatly enhances the students’ prospects of finding rewarding and relevant employment at the end of their studies. The school assists students in securing work placements, undertaking live briefs, engaging directly with employers and developing key employability skills. The School is committed to raising student awareness of the opportunities that exist post-graduation.
Additional materials: £50 to 200 per semester - Prices vary according your subject of practice.
Additional Field Trips: £50 to 400 - Prices will vary according to location.
Additional Events: £300 - Degree Show/New Designers. Costs will vary according to the medium and mode of your practice but considerations will be around materials, installation and presentation.
Further information on these additional costs will be provided prior to the start of your studies
The University is committed to a transparent fee structure, with no hidden costs, to help you make an informed decision. This includes information on what is included in the fee and how fees are calculated and reviewed
Students must have studied a minimum of two years post GCSE level. However, it is expected that some applicants will be mature students with work experience, who wish to further their career development. These applicants will be processed through standard procedures, which may involve an interview as part of the process. Please see http://wlv.ac.uk/mature for further information.
Most students will be able to apply for a loans to pay for these subject to eligibility. To find out more information please refer to the government Student Finance website.
Changes for EU students:
The UK government has confirmed that EU students starting courses from 1 August 2021 will normally be classified as having Overseas Fee status. More information about the change is available at UKCISA:
EU citizens living in the UK with 'settled' status, and Irish nationals living in the UK or Ireland, will still be classified as Home students, providing they meet the usual residency requirements, for more information about EU Settlement Scheme (EUSS) click here.
Self-funding:
If you don’t want to take out a loan to pay your fees or if you aren’t eligible to receive a loan, you might want to take advantage of the University’s scheme to pay by instalments: See How to pay.
Your employer, embassy or organisation can pay for your Tuition fees:
If your employer, embassy or organisation agrees to pay all or part of your tuition fees; the University will refer to them as your sponsor and will invoice them for the appropriate amount.
We must receive notification of sponsorship in writing as soon as possible, and before enrolment, confirming that the sponsor will pay your tuition fees.
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