Portfolio Review

[this is a repost from my non-school journal, for those of you who read both]

So, all semester I have been working on my Fine Arts portfolio. Every student wishing to pursue a degree in any studio art must submit a portfolio after so many classes. The portfolio must be accepted for the student to be officially accepted into the Fine Arts department. If the portfolio is rejected, well, you find a new major because you are not accepted to the department. And, the portfolio is not simply work from your specific concentration.. It must include pieces from Drawing I and Design I as well. And other art classes if you wish. But the “foundation” classes for a studio art degree must be in there, no matter what your concentration is.

This is how the review goes: There are reviews scheduled ALL day. You arrive early, so you can set up your pieces by the time your review is scheduled for. Then 3 professors/instructors from the department walk in. This is your review board. You don’t know who is on your board until they walk in. THEY don’t even know who’s board they are on until the morning of review day. So, you introduce yourself to any instructor you don’t know. Hand out your table of contents. Then you leave. For 20-30 minutes. And wait in the lobby area of the Fine Arts floor while they look at your work and talk about your work and decide if they want to accept the portfolio. Then one of them comes to bring you back in and you find out at the decision is and then talk about the good things, the bad things, the things that can be worked on, etc.
All semester I’ve been working on this thing. Late nights at the darkroom. Late nights cuting mats for my photos. Late nights shrink wrapping my drawings. Several meetings with my photo advisor to decide what to put in and what to edit out.

Then yesterday. The day was here. My review was at 11:15am. I got there at 10:45am. A friend of mine, Anita, who is also a photo major, was up for review right before me. When I got there she was sitting in the lobby waiting for them to come and get her. We talked for a while, it helped ease the nerves a bit. Then they came for her and I was left alone. I was so damn nervous. After a while I was called on. I passed Anita in the hall as I was walking to the room. She got in. Congrats!

I get to the room and I’m setting up my portfolio for display and my board walks in. This is who I had:

Mr. Jensen - my photo advisor, I knew he’d be there.

Mr. Fiorentino - haha, my BOSS, I am his ceramics lab assistant, and I took his Ceramics I class last summer.

Mr. Balasis - I’ve never had a class with him. He has never seen my work. He is the graphic design professor. I have met him before though. When I took digital photo, the printer we used was in his office. He always seemed pretty nice.

So, I was pretty happy with who I got for my board. I handed out my table of contents and then I had to leave. Those were the longest 25 minutes of my life. I almost convinced myself that I was out. I was so nervous. Mr. Jensen came to get me when they were done talking and he didn’t say anything. We got to the room and I sat in a chair that was pulled up for me. Until they finally told me.. that I am IN! My portfolio was accepted! I was so relieved. Then each instructor took turns telling me what they liked about my work and then offered advice for things I need to work on. It went very well. I got some great advice. And! We talked about a switch in one of the required classes for me.

Visual Communications I is required for any studio art major. Basically, it’s typography. But, we discussed a switch for me because I want to work more with Photoshop to work on my digital photo skills. So! Instead I will get to take Computer Graphics I! That is exciting. I was already not looking forward to Vis Com I. So, Mr. Jensen and I have to talk and make some changes so I can take Computer Graphics I instead of Vis Com I. We also talked about me doing an Independant Study for a semester in photog. So I can build a project and expand on some of the ideas and suggestions they gave me. It will be a lot of work, but it will be a good thing.

So, I’m incredibly happy that my portfolio was accepted.