IN PICTURES: Historic locations in Black Country and Staffordshire inspire University of Wolverhampton art students
Historic Black Country buildings and Staffordshire woodland provided the inspiration for the latest works by art students at the University of Wolverhampton.
From the Victorian-built Grand Post House building in Princess Street, Wolverhampton, to Shoal Hill Common on Cannock Chase, the Fine Art undergraduates have been exploring some of the region's treasured sites.
Lecturers at the university asked them to take on board their surroundings and reflect it in their creations.
The resulting artwork has been exhibited in various different ways including temporary sculpture trails and temporary exhibitions.
Gavin Rogers, Senior Lecturer in Fine Art at the University of Wolverhampton, said: "Each off-site project has been a unique micro 'artist-in-residency' experience, giving our students insight into what it is like to work in the public realm and to respond to sites in both a practical and theoretical context."
"For example, students explored and rummaged through archive material at the Old Post Office and created site responsive work which was exhibited at a 'show and tell' seminar recently – from stamps to maps, from paint peelings to digital imagery – the work produced has left us time travelling from past to present."
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Plans are in place to revamp the former post office in Wolverhampton into a 1,000 capacity concert hall and business hub, coffee shop and restaurant under ambitious plans submitted by a Wolverhampton-based consortium.
But in the meantime the second year students took advantage of the site to inspire their work.
They also visited the derelict site of Springfield Brewery where work has now started to transform it into a £60 million university campus that would cater for thousands of students in its dual role as the new West Midlands University Technical College (UTC) and a school of architecture.
Students donned high-visibility clothing and worked alongside the estates teams to gather information, objects and histories about the former working brewery. They exhibited their work on site including a range of textural paintings and large scale sculptures.
There was then the visit to Shoal Hill Common where students were given historical information about the site in order to create a temporary sculpture trail.
Rebecca Stewart was one of those who visited and created a thought-provoking work featuring herself amid the sprawling woodlands.
She said: "It was really interesting to explore buildings and landscapes outside of the University buildings, taking into account the history of places and what they have meant to people over the years.
"We then had to build that meaning into creating artwork that has some relevance to the place where it will be exhibited."
The students also delivered teaching session to pupils at Heath Park School and contributed works to be exhibited at the museum of Cannock Chase.
