Post-Grad Community loves to hear what our alumni are doing and upon seeing CSM MA Art & Science Alumni Melanie King's recent tweet about her residency at the Fish Factory in Cornwall we reached out to her, keen to get an update on what she has been doing since graduating.
Hello, I graduated from the MA Art and Science at Central Saint Martins in 2013. Right after graduating, I began creating opportunities for myself and others. Myself and fellow UAL alumni Louise Beer and Rebecca Huxley started Lumen Studios, a collective focused on astronomy and light.
Louise and I were also given the opportunity to direct super/collider by Chris Hatherill, who had moved to Hong Kong and is now based in Canada. I also began the London Alternative Photography Collective in 2013, and asked UAL alumni Almudena Romero , Diego Valente and Hannah Fletcher to join me as co-directors in 2015. All of these collectives began small and have grown over time. We often hired spaces to begin with, and then were eventually offered paid opportunities.
"To current students and recent graduates, I would recommend collaborating with other students that you find interesting based on your own creative vision! If you think outside of the traditional "white box" gallery space, you can also find venues for free or very cheap".
As a working class artist who has been independent from a young age, I also found it valuable to work alongside my studies. Throughout my education at CSM, I used the temping agency "Arts Temps". Through Arts Temps, I got a job for 4.5 years at the Photography and the Archive Research Centre (PARC) at London College of Communication - this was an amazing experience, as I got to meet some great photographers and curators. Towards the end of my role, I also collaborated with Professor Val Williams at PARC on quite a few freelance London Alt Photo projects such as the Shadows Symposium and a wet collodion portrait studio for visitors to Elephant and Castle shopping centre. I also had the opportunity to teach for the first time at LCC.
"I am now doing a PhD at the Royal College of Art, and hope to complete in 2021".
My partner (who I met during my time at UAL) Look Mum No Computer has a successful Youtube Channel and Patreon page. I was inspired by him to create my own Youtube Channel and Patreon , based on my own practice. I do a lot of online teaching currently, and these platforms give me a channel to share ideas and my working processes. I see the potential of Patreon and Youtube as a way to have creative and financial freedom, and I feel like there aren't many visual artists who are using the platform at the moment. I recently built a twitter page to promote other artists on Patreon which I hope will gain traction.
One of my suggestions for lockdown would be to think about how you might be able to share your skills and ideas online. What can other people learn from your work?
Could you collaborate with another artist online? Can you form collectives online during this time, with a view to exhibiting when it is safe to do so?"
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