Collective and Collaborative Drawing in Contemporary Practice: Drawing Conversations

Whilst both collective and collaborative drawing is being widely explored internationally, both within and beyond educational institutions, there is surprisingly little serious research published on the topic. This realisation led to the first international Drawing Conversations Symposium, accompanied by the Drawn Conversations Exhibition at Coventry University, UK, in December 2015. The two events drew a strong and global response, and brought together a wide range of participants, including academics, artists, researchers, designers, architects and doctoral students. This book considers what happens, and how, when people draw together either in the form of a collaboration, or through a collective process. The contributions here serve to establish the field of collective and collaborative drawing as distinct from the types of drawing undertaken by artists, designers, and architects within a professional context. The volume covers conversations through the act of drawing, collaborative drawing, drawing communities, and alternative drawing collaborations.

Jill Journeaux is Professor of Fine Art Education and Research Degree Leader at Coventry School of Art and Design at Coventry University, UK. She is an artist and researcher with particular interests in the ways that drawing can represent physical, emotional and psychological realities. Her research in the field of fine art education considers the evolving nature of fine art, the teaching of creativity and the shifting place of fine art within the academy. She is an external Director of TRACEY, the Group for Drawing and Visualisation Research, at Loughborough University and Treasurer of the Group for Learning in Art and Design. She is a member of the organizing committee of the National Association for Fine Art Education (NAFAE), which she chaired from 2003 to 2007. She now organizes the annual symposia for the Association. Helen Gørrill holds a PhD in contemporary British painting, which was co-supervised by Coventry University and the RCA. She is currently writing her book Women Cant Paint: Gender, the Glass Ceiling and Values in Contemporary Art for I.B. Tauris (2018). Helen holds First Class undergraduate degrees in both Drawing, and Contemporary Applied Arts, along with a prize-winning MRes in Gender Studies for work on Helen Chadwicks uncatalogued archive at the Henry Moore Institute. Her own artwork is digitally archived at the Elizabeth Sackler Center for Feminist Art at the Brooklyn Museum in New York. Helens work on drawing and gender has featured in many publications including The Guardian (Britain is not radical enough), Embroidery Magazine and Skin 2.