The UAL foundation merger and move to Lime Grove has impacted the delivery of curriculum in the illustration area where I teach. In our previous building, we had the printmaking studio attached to the teaching studio, facilitating the use of printmaking as a teaching tool and allowing easy access to students with impaired mobility. Students made the connection between academic learning and technical learning because of the visibility of the space. The importance of print is not only subject specific, but is integral to the “thinking through making” approach we encourage in foundation. The aim is not to make students into prolific printmakers, but to help them make the connection between academic learning and technical learning to realise their ideas. This is a step towards building confidence in seeking out other technical and expert resources they might need in the future. The accessibility of the studio ensured that any student with mobility issues did not find a barrier to entering the space.
In its current state, the Printmaking studio is not easily accessible to students with mobility issues due to its location and layout. It is located at the back of the campus, only accessible by a long walk in a broken pavement making wheeling anything difficult. The access door to the building is heavy and only manually opened. Currently, there is only 1 lift in the campus that is not close to the studio and is not appropriate for the capacity of the campus. The layout of the space is cramped and does not allow free movement of anyone that needs more manoeuvring space.
Under the Equality act, the university has the legal duty to make ‘reasonable adjustment/s’ to accommodate students that have impaired mobility. For this reason, I would like to create an intervention that explores the idea of a movable print studio.
My intervention would look at how processes present in the print studio such as screenprinting and relief printing can be miniaturised and moved into other spaces of the campus, bringing the possibility of printmaking to anyone that cannot easily go to the studio. By tackling the most important accessibility issue, many others will follow. By encouraging deeper connections between studio teaching and technical resources, students will be empowered to take ownership of how they arrange workspace and encounter scale in their work. Making print visible and accessible to more students, not less, is a starting point for eliminating barriers for learning.
Sources:
Hackathorn, J. (2011) ‘Learning by Doing: An Empirical Study of Active Teaching Techniques’, The Journal of Effective Teaching, pp. 45 – 60
Bamber, V & Jones, A (2015), Enabling inclusive learning, ch 11, pp 154-16
Evol Stud Imaginative Cult. 2020 ; 4(1): 77–90. doi:10.26613/esic/4.1.172, Thinking avant la lettre: A Review of 4E Cognition James Carney [Wellcome Trust Fellow in the Medical Humanities]
UAL (2020). Disability and dyslexia. [online] UAL. Available at: https://www.arts.ac.uk/students/student-services/disability-and-dyslexia. (accessed 19 Jun. 2025)
Arts.ac.uk. (2025). [online] Available at: https://canvas.arts.ac.uk/sites/explore/SitePage/45679/disability-service-training (Accessed 19 Jun. 2025).