Dimensions of visual and spatial intelligence

This module introduces students to aspects of vision and visuality leading to a better understanding the nature of visual intelligence and its role in personality, culture and life-long development. Students will explore concepts such as spatial organization, visual acuity and fundamentals of aesthetics in cognition. These issues will be examined in portfolio oriented and problem-based tasks.

This multi-dimensional module will direct students to explore issues, techniques and strategies associated with visual arts in local communities. They will engage in the interrogation of diverse artforms, styles and technologies, both traditional and contemporary. Students are expected to initiate interventions with respect to presentation and analysis of visual arts in the community.

Digital futures in art and design education

This module is intended to introduce students to the theoretical and practical components of digital design so that they are able to handle design issues at various levels of analysis in and outside the education sector. They will explore and experiment with digital concepts, principles as well as the application of software such as ArtRage, InDesign, Corel Draw and Adobe Photoshop etc., These applications will constitute significant dimensions of the module as students explore design issues and processes.

Portfolio building and construction

This module provides a creative platform for the student to pursue more deeply the concept of portfolio construction processes in the context of the design problem environment. The portfolio building will be guided by perspectives which include design industry standards, professional skills, employment and technical issues such as photography and CGI. The module integrates theoretical and practical dimensions targeted at the construction of the actual portfolios in traditional and digital modes.

Design Laboratory: Creative Exploration of 2-D Art

The module is intended to develop in students fundamental design skills through creative analysis, synthesis and communication of visual information. Students are expected to demonstrate awareness and proficiency in manipulating art elements and principles of design. This will be achieved through critical study of design issues followed by intensive studio-based practice in order to enable students appreciate the versatility of design.

Analytical Drawing and Visual Research

This module is intended to provide the academic, intellectual and technical bases for the development of an individualized approach to the graphic language of drawing. Through intensive studio practice and regular critiques, the student-artist is challenged to creatively explore among other issues, problems in drawing formats and conventions as well as composition and technique. The student is guided thematically through processes and procedures which emphasize the integration of theoretical models and practical knowledge in the construction of visual discourses. The module demands an acute awareness of the theoretical implications of drawing as an independent form of aesthetic expression and inquiry.

Painting Studio

This module is intended to introduce the student to fundamental principles, media and studio skills related to the exploration and development of easel painting as an independent fine art form. It assumes that the student has already been successful in handling problems related to design-in-the-flat, spatial composition dynamics and basic chromatics. It also assumes that the student is familiar with the major styles and movements in the history of painting, especially the Renaissance, Baroque, Romanticism, Impressionism and beyond. The module therefore encourages the student to interrogate visual-aesthetic problems emanating from a diversity of perspectives in the approach to the fine art. The penultimate purpose is to encourage independence in painting style.

Visual Design and Digital Imaging

This module introduces students to the basic systems and structures related to the application of design software to expressive and creative Art and Design. Hands-on experience and industry specific perspectives will be prioritised in the location, assessment and deployment of available digital software packages for specific visual communication and multi-media design projects. Students will also be introduced to basic techniques in creative programming and simulation exercises.

History of Art and Design in Sub-Saharan Africa

Studies in critical museology

This module introduces students to the museum as an art institution which deals with cultural heritage. The module entails visits to museums and studying its operations. Guest lecturers are part of the modules as well as simulations and curating of exhibitions.

Art historiography and art history

At its very core, this professional second level module is essentially designed as an introduction to the theoretical ideas and methodological principles underlying the academic study of the development of art from ancient times to contemporary postmodernism. In pursuit of this purpose the module provides basic training in stylistics to enable the undergraduate student to effectively explore, interrogate and apply relevant conceptual tools in the analysis and interpretation of key theoretical themes, styles, art works, movements and ideologies associated with the emergence and development of art history as a discipline in the academy. It also looks this development from the perspective of art historiography (or the theory of history itself, thus laying the foundation of informed theoretical understanding of art including its ideological mask and its nature as a phenomenon of the past. Because of this slant students are advised that the module is not a traditional ‘period survey’ type of art history module where dates and names are memorized. Rather, it entails the systematic review of the discourses and theoretical models related to the study of art over historical time, with emphasis on the central questions regarding the human motivation for art and the ‘causal’ reasons for change in the art of different or intervening periods and epochs. Some basic

Graphic Development in Children’s Art

This theoretical and practical module is meant to prepare students to be able to appreciate how children develop in visual representation as well as self-expression. Emphasis is on the various developmental stages and their characteristics in addition to exploration of issues related to methodologies. The module entails visits to sites where children are situated including homes to study their graphic development. Comparisons are made of children’s visual imagery from different cultural, social and economic contexts. Students should be able to profile children’s growing aesthetic development and suggest strategies of scaffolding them in their artistic evolvement.

Work Integrated learning

In this module students will be attached to art related institutions such as museums, art galleries, art studios art workshops among others with the aim of acquiring knowledge and skills relevant to those institutions and how that could relate to art education in the school system.

Methods in critical analysis of art objects

In this module students will be exposed to the fundamental origins of art critical dismodule. Students will explore the stylistic, that is, object nomenclature and classifications. They will examine the theories and methodologies including the purposes and functions of art in human societies. They will cover major theories in art dismodule that include formalist theory of art; psychological theory of art; contextualist theory of art; socio-political theory of art and linguistic theory of art. The disciplinary domains in the visual arts include aesthetics; art criticism; art history and art production.

Curriculum Models in Art and Design Education

This module is intended to equip students with a broad foundation of the available models that they can be used in a variety of contexts. The module deals with the theoretical foundations of curriculum design and its implementation. Students will have a chance to analyse and critique art and design curricula models used in various countries. The models are analysed in the context of multicultural art education that is characteristic of contemporary classrooms. Students will be engaged in designing of curricula suitable for a variety of educational contexts.

Polyculturalism in Art and Design Education

Polyculturalism is a contemporary phenomenon in most educational contexts. This module is intended to analyse the nature of art education focusing on its polycultural nature. It aims at developing students’ understanding of the plurality of contemporary classrooms. The module discusses the different educational policies and ideologies that impact on classroom management and pedagogy. It suggests how teachers can accommodate cultural diversity.

Surface and non-surface textile ensembles

This is multi-disciplinary studio-based as well as theoretical module aimed to assist students understand fabric and textiles as three-dimensional art and their relevance to culture. They will develop an understanding of how textile design is applied. It aims at developing visual and practical skills through exploring a wide range of textile materials. The module aims at integrating theory and practice through the medium of textiles. Students will apply colour, structure, pattern and texture in the process of developing technical, sensory and aesthetic abilities.

Malleable Media Sculpture

Visual Aesthetics: Contested issues, territories and practices

Basically, aesthetics is one of the four disciplines comprising the ‘structure’ of Art and Design. It is the discipline centered on the questions related to the philosophy of art and the theory of ‘beauty.’  The term visual aesthetics places conceptual emphasis on analysis of artistry. The module is structured to provide students with the basic conceptual tools and methodological framework needed to tackle key issues and problems inherent in their study of theory not only in aesthetics, but also in art history, art criticism, and their own art making. It also provides a comprehensive grounding in the central issues in the art discipline, the stages in its historical development and the theoretical models applicable to it as a unique and distinct form of knowledge and apprehension of the world.  

Contemporary African Art and Design in the global sphere

The module is designed along the lines of traditional survey in the history of Art and Design. In this context, the module explores major thematic areas and aesthetic traditions and geographies applicable to post-colonial Africa south of the Sahara. It begins with a critical examination of some of the discourses implicated in the invention of the notion of an African art post the colonial encounter before moving to an analysis of the various regional artistic variations and the problems arising from the label ‘contemporary’ and ‘modern’ in relation to art theory and art history. In this process, the development of styles, workshops, schools and training networks is also examined alongside theoretical models and conceptual frameworks arising from a diversity of sources including ethno-aesthetics and semiotics.

Plastic and clastic dimensions in painting

Students taking this intermediate module are presumed to have made the professional decision to proceed and be specialists in this finest of the visual arts. In this module students will investigate painting, its concerns, technical strategies covering territory and material from the beginning of easel painting to the developments in modernism, postmodern and the postcolonial. Against the background of this knowledge of the traditions and purposes of painting, students are expected to work independently to achieve their own style of expression working within the creative possibilities of the ‘plastic’ and two-dimensional language of painting.

Printmaking thesis

Research project

This module is meant to equip students with knowledge and understanding of arts-based research as a systematic application of artistic processes, focused on appreciation of epistemological processes of artistic knowing and inquiry. The module is a consolidation of general research methodologies but anchored on the visual arts. Students will engage in practical inquiry and application of visual art methodologies in case studies as a mode of learning. This will enable students appreciate the significance of peculiar research knowledge and its relevance in disciplinary study.