so welcome again everyone my name is Zach Davey I am an admissions officer at Ry Rhode Island School of Design I am also the regional representative for international students um and I'll be giving today's presentation it's uh generally on portfolio tips and we'll have time for Q&A afterwards and I'll pass it to my colleague elj hi everybody I'm LJ I am also admissions officer at Ry um I'll be kind of working the background today um kind of chat managing and um answering your questions in the background um there will be an opportunity for question and answer at the end so I'll save some questions for then as well um please use the there's like a Q&A chat box function for questions so please type your questions in there um it should be a little bit you know at the bottom of your of your Zoom screen um to the right so again use that Q&A chat box um and I can answer your questions through there awesome thank you thank you I'll go ahead and share my screen LJ does everything look okay on your end yes yeah awesome thank you thank you and I'll go ahead and turn off my video for the duration of the presentation as well um but yes welcome again everyone so you're probably all here because you're considering art schools or art programs and that's fantastic um the most important part of your application to almost any art school will be your portfolio so the really broad definition of a portfolio is a collection of examples that showcase your thinking and making in your creative practice but the portfolio you put together for your Rd application has additional specifications and parameters all art schools have different portfolio requirements and look for different things so in this presentation I'm going to go in depth about what Rd specifically looks for in a portfolio so let's start with the basic requirements your risty portfolio is meant to be a highly curated limited selection of just your strongest examples of your visual artwork you'll use slide room an online portfolio platform to submit your application to Ry in slide room you need to include at least 12 pieces and you'll have up to 20 slots that you can fill the limited space of the application portfolio requires careful selection of pieces to include and deciding which pieces to exclude please include only the pieces that you feel are the strongest most interesting to you or the most unique to you this can include process and preliminary pieces this can include Sketchbook Pages this can include design or architectural work you'll use the online portfolio application sirro to submit your portfolio to Ry so this requires digital documentation of your work and I'd also like to clarify too we no longer require the Ry assignment if you see anything online about a Ry assignment please know that that was a past requirement and as of now we no longer require it for seeing your visual artwork we just require the portfolio of 12 to 20 submissions so generally when we're reviewing your applications portfolio we're looking for your creativity personality risk-taking experimentation UniQue Ideas curiosity and thoughtful visual decisions it's also helpful for for reviewers to see how you think how you take your initial idea and develop into a final piece this can include sketches studies storyboards 3D model studies or prototypes just to name a few you can include your research into a specific subject matter the development of a new technique or learning a new tool to Aid your ability to produce a final piece when we review your portfolio we also look to see if you'd be a good fit for how Ry teaches your Ry education will begin with the experiments on Foundation studies program or EFS for short we take all incoming first year students and we'll divide you into sections of 20 and as a section you'll take three Studio classes you'll take [Music] design drawing in this drawing class the student here made her own drawing tool by tipping an eraser to a long stick uh definitely try to make your own drawing tools working unconventional ways and lastly the third course is spatial Dynamics or a fancy word for 3D design students in this class design and built their own musical instruments um so it's a good idea to keep the EFS classes in mind when putting together your portfolio again since all first year students begin their res education in the experimental and Foundation studies program this means that you will not be applying directly to a major this means that your work shouldn't be restricted to one interest or medium it's a good idea to consider General values that we hold near like experimentation process conceptual thought creative problem solving and technical skills one question we hear all the time in admissions is what important what is more important technical skill or concept I want to start with these two ideas so first when we say technical skill what do we mean so referring to how you purposefully use your materials to achieve a finished piece or Endeavor here are some key terms to consider when you think about technical skill composition Mark making texture movement color space point of view and light so I can show you some examples so composition how do you arrange all the different elements within a piece I want to emphasize too our ey moves throughout the entire piece here not just the center we see a lot of uh students when they submit their portfolio they'll Center their subject matter um so yes uh be aware of that you know um be think about the composition and how again ouris can move throughout the entire framing how can you arrange all the different elements there another example using photography and digital drawing I see a question in the chat if you don't mind could you repeat what we look for in the portfolio there was a drop in connection um the rest of the presentation from here on out we're still in the beginning so the presentation will cover that um um going forward Mark making is another thing that we look for um Mark making uh some of you might not be familiar uh Mark making rever to all the different marks coming together in a drawing to uh yeah how how do all these different marks come together and what are the different qualities of these marks for example a pen Mark uh will have a very different quality than say a large paintbrush going throughout a campus they have different textur opacities um thicknesses and uh all these different marks coming together is what we refer to with Mark making so we do like to see varied Mark makings seeing that you're trying different approaches of creating marks on a canvas piece of paper or in any other medium texture on a similar note the literal feel of a tactile surface or material or the appearance of a tactile surface or material you'll want to consider something like texture when making architectural drawings as well in Mark Bradford's paintings texture drives this process he starts by covering his canvas with at least 10 layers of papers as well as embedding linear elements like string then he attacks it with power Sanders and other tools to expose earlier layers flashes of color and unexpected G positions not until the first sanding does he begins to see where the painting is going so I think that's a great example of of very unconventional approach to we love to see uncon unconventional approaches and how do they create unconventional final outcomes nafas M white made a series of sculptures made entirely out of hair and her accessories inspired by the Victorian era tradition of art crafted from hair of deceased loved ones in these pieces they honor African American hair styling techniques celebrates the invent inventiveness care and love that sh between people especially black women also be sure to think about texture in your digital pieces too um drawing tools created in programming software processing exported as PDF files uh or um or shown here as well processing is a fun tool to try out uh programming for art and sign purposes as well I've used processing a lot as well in the past and there's also p PJs is another great opt option also think about space too um in two-dimensional work how you create the illusion or Dimension or a purposeful point to the flatness of a surface how you create or purposefully not create a sense of foreground Middle Ground receding background this can also refer to how you physically place your piece in a room or a digital [Music] platform point of view how you compose your piece and relation to the viewer in other words is the viewer looking at the subject from below from behind from one mile away light how do you use areas of light and dark to create an illusion of space a sense of mood add emphasis in your piece sorry the slide had some trouble loading for a second there I think light is great to think about when you document your uh sculptures and other three-dimensional work as well think about how the lighting is affecting the piece you can also consider the color and temperature of the lighting here it's kind of cold early morning light just like Providence Rhode Island at this hour um it makes the piece feel very empty uh this is a warm light afternoon light like Providence later today um it feels much coier color how you use hue through materials and surface one question that we hear all the time oh well sorry I I should have said that um what I want to say is that we want you to challenge you yourself to use your technical skill to go further than just an exercise about technique um that is the important thing here uh technical skill is great to see in the portfolio but we don't want to see pieces that are just showcasing technical skill we want to see how you can really push this further in different kinds of creative Endeavors so some key ideas going forward to about concept or mood idea or concept narrative and goal so mood the feeling or impression that the piece leaves on the viewer for example the two very different moods showcased here um also for example Joys work here the warmth of a mother spoon and a baby spoon that's sold within even industrial design work can show um a warmth and mood in this kind of way sorry my slides were having trouble loading for a second there um but also idea or concept what you want the viewer to start thinking about when they look at or interact with your work this can be a particular point of view or set of values this can be large or small scale issues for example comparing the horrors of war with privileged [Music] consumerism narrative the story your peace tells this can be an illustration of linear series of events storyboard or suggestion of a story for example little the entirety of the story of Little Red Riding Hood is shown on the left [Music] here goal especially with the science based work um how is your piece functional what kind type of problem is your piece trying to solve for example this is a gardening tool garding tool for arthritis patients so again uh risty does not define technical skill as photorealism too we we don't need to see photorealistic work uh we want to see that you are um still experimenting even while working on your technical skill that you're still showcasing your own own personality and uh your own interests as well this also does not mean that your concept have Concepts have to be huge or lofty I think a lot of the work that I showed just now had wonderful Concepts and meanings but uh they didn't always need to be huge or to you as well they can really be personal and unique to you I think that's what's most important to us so we also want you all to vary your process to try avoid make the every piece the same exact way in your portfolio try out different processes different methods to create all of your work and when we save area process this does not mean that you have to bounce around to every material and try every discipline in the world if you're not interested in architectural oil paint you don't have to try it we just want to see that you're working outside of your comfort zone and trying different things avoid formulas as much as possible as you work on your portfolio three different takes on portraiture it's a great [Music] example maybe turn your character design into a wearable costumes think about how you can push your pieces in different ways excuse me um for example this piece here is called Nostalgia Monster uh it's a character an animation mixed with material experimentation and then finally made into a wearable piece Mark making is now restrict to drawing try to think about this with every discipline and material you use um so even if you like working in one discipline like photography consider how you can experiments lighting if you're interested in portraiture consider the background have fun with setting up different textures or patterns it does have to be expensive photo paper Dennis uses Turf orange plastic fencing aluminum foil blinds be sure to have fun with it play with the Shadows layering is important to think about collaging mixed media I always encourage for students when working on the portfolios here's some mixed media of Photography Pebbles on top of a crumpled photo of a bird's nest or empty threads of spool on top of a portrait think about the manipulation with photography so yeah so those are some examples for photography specifically and remember that a strong drawing can look like so many different things I recommend including some pieces based on Direct observation this means that working from real life people objects and places in front of you so not working from photos or videos I discourage drawing from photographs in general because this will often lead to flatten or Ed drawings again your drawings do not have to be photo realistic a strong drawing can look like so many different things try making your own still like uh still life image on the right is what the still life look like and the image on the left is the final drawing one thing I'm I'm going to go back to this photo as well because I think another great part of it maybe there's another example later on but I just want to emphasize that the student on the right is looking at what they're drawing to that uh be sure as you're drawing from observation to really look at what you're drawing and not always the paper that you're holding also try drawing what's around you um Tara describes that my mother's house is a messy house the piles of random clutter found in almost every room are a manifestation of and a metaphor for the strains complicated relationships and emotional intensities of the house we're cluttered frustrated loving folk my mother and I it's complicated but it's it's our house is a quote from [Music] T draw outside as much possible to bring your Sketchbook go outside feel free to experiment with color in your drawings I think this is a great example of that try drawing buildings around you draw from observation again nature bring your iPad with you if you're working digitally or your laptop um bring a Sketchbook pens color pencils whatever medium I've even seen wonderful sketchbooks where students have uh used non- drawing materials like I've seen students use pieces of fabric and uh other elements um pieces of wood that they found glue sticks uh to make their drawings in their Sketchbook that's always uh really exciting to [Music] see some more examples even in your Sketchbook still consider Mark making and layering so here are some things that we recommend avoiding as well digital tools allow easier and faster execution for example recreating a photo with oil paint is difficult while recreating a photo digitally is largely trivial criteria for 2D digital art is exactly the same as those for physical materials depending on the intent of the Creator consider the Mastery of the use of balance color drawing skill expressive comp composition Harmony light Mark making sense of space I know this is for the what to avoid um uh slide but my point is to avoid having digital art feel separate from everything else you know you can uh really experiment as much as possible uh with your digital work and I would recommend doing so even with digital work we are still looking for all of the things I mentioned earlier in this presentation concept mood narrative uh texture Mark making all these things are just as important with digital work as they are for physical work but yeah going forward some other some things that we recommend avoiding so Master copies uh please don't include Master copies in your portfolio they can be great to build your technical skill um but they don't give us any insight into you as an artist to clarify for everyone Master copies are Recreations of an artwork by another artist usually a famous artist but can be from anyone else uh same thing for fan art for the same reason as well we don't want to see you working from other people's designs or Creations we want to see your designs and Creations so please do not include Master copies and Fan Art in your portfolio again uh please don't include anime as well anime is a such a set style that it's difficult for students to break out of it and really develop their own style within anime so um it's great to be inspired by anime but I would encourage you all to be inspired ired by say compositions or a sense of drama rather than just stylization and then lastly if you're interested in architecture or interior design um please do not include traditional floor plans in your portfolio we still want to see your creativity and unique points of view even in your architecture and design work and lastly uh please please please do not submit your portfolio in this format uh LJ can attest to this as well um it makes it very difficult for us to read your portfolio uh when we see lots of tiny bits of images and cluttered text and titles all over the place um we just want to see simple easy to see images of your work and please don't include text on the SL itself like title medium and description um there is a side column to insert all that information for again title medium and description can all be inserted in the side column so please do not includ the image I think up to three images is okay to include in a single image slide but if you do have a piece where you want to show several images of process or um say several angles of a sculpture and it goes over three to three or so images I'd recommend uploading a video slideshow that way it can still be one slide in your portfolio but we can see all the photos nonetheless um there's no time limit length on that video um but it helps us see the work uh individually we can scrub through and see different parts of the images and focus in on them while still seeing them as large as they could possibly can be doesn't need any fancy editing or anything and then just to answer the question to um video art and videos films you can include them in your portfolio but I would recommend around two to three minutes at most to ensure that the admissions committee will watch from beginning to ends uh you can submit longer videos just know that the committee will likely start skipping through the video if it's uh longer than that so I would be aware of that and one last thing I want to end on is make now curate later do not be too uh concerned about curation at this point do not be too concerned about what will look good next to what what order should my portfolio be and I would uh encourage you all to really focus on the making aspect while you have the time now that is what is most important and then as it gets closer to the deadline you can start thinking about which pieces you want to exclude from your portfolio and which pieces you want to include cool thanks everyone I hope that was helpful insightful for the portfolio um yeah we can switch it over to Q&A now and also thanks for bearing with me this very early morning hour I flumed a few of those slides so thank you all again for uh staying with me um but yeah let's see hey I don't know if you just um if you want to make me the co-host just because I can't for some reason start my video again oh weird so I'll make you look cool sorry about that that's okay um yeah so we have one that is um you know kind of a quick one is a live figure drawing from a model a good source of drawing from Life yeah totally um with figure drawing though uh just be aware that a lot of students will have experience with figure drawing a lot of students will showcase that in their portfolio um but it can still be a wonderful place to draw inspiration or just develop your drawing capabilities um you know one when you're drawing from figures as well be sure and this goes for all drawings from observation But be sure you're still experimenting especially with Mark making and other approaches we still want to see your experimental approaches because at the end of the day that'll that is what will make your figure drawings your figure drawings not someone else's um and what else um I've even I saw one student who ripped out all of their figure drawings from their Sketchbook and collaged it onto a larger piece of paper I thought that was a nice example of uh still showing us their drawing capabilities but also showing us their creativity and experimentation too um yeah the short answer is yes um this one's not related to the portfolio but it's a little bit of a longer answer so I figured we could answer it um live it's about transferring um and about how flexible the EFS requirements are and how transfer credit would play into it yeah um I'm glad you mentioned transferring before I answer that question I want to clarify so some of my portfolio tip recommendations would change from this presentation if you're applying as a transfer student they're mostly the same but the biggest thing to be aware of is you do apply directly to a major as a transfer um so I would just be aware of that uh going forward uh to kind of push your portfolio towards one major or one Department only if you're applying as a transfer then sorry uh was trying to find the question to answer the rest of the parts um how flexible the EFS requirements are so when you transfer you will likely take a summer EFS course too it's a six- week uh version of the experimental foundations program over the summer um so you'll likely still have to take it it is possible to be waved uh from that program but you're automatically considered to be waved as we review your application you'll receive with your decision whether or not you've been waved in that program but just know uh it's unlikely to be waved a lot of students will in up taking the summer EFS program um how transfer credits would play into it so yeah so to apply as a transfer you need at least 27 college credits and at least 12 of those credits need to be in the liberal arts so courses like Humanities literary arts history philosophy social sciences art history that's what those 12 creds we count towards I think we also count um Math and Science towards those liberal arts credits as well well it's just uh um a lot of students will take a lot of Studio courses to prepare for Ry which is great but we still want to see at least 12 uh liberal arts credits of the 27 and yeah I um LJ if you can find our transfer credit policy and put that in the chat that would be awesome thank you thank you okay so as I do that we have two questions that are similar so we'll kind of combine them um does your portfolio need to be kind of curated or specific to um the major that you choose yeah so transfer students yes first your applicants if you're in high school applying to Verity no um uh you are uh not applying directly to a major as a first year applicant so your portfolio should reflect uh different approaches different mediums processes we want to see that you're experimenting and trying different things more specific specifically you're applying to the experimental Foundation studies program that I mentioned during the presentation uh that was the big reason why I uh talked about that [Music] program yes um and then this one again is not related to the portfolio but I think you might have part you know partaken in this um it's a question about the computation technology and culture concentration um just a little bit about that totally um I yes alj was right I was in the computation technology culture concentration I loved it I had an amazing time in that program um you can pair it with any uh department at Ry I'll put a link to their website in the chat too so computation technology and culture can be paired with any major it's essentially equivalent of a minor not a major um so you could pair it with painting industrial design whatever but you couldn't maure in that program um but yeah it's can't recommend it enough it's essentially what you would expect um it's similar to a computer science degree but specifically for artists so having said that it's very different than say computer science at uh other colleges and universities um there still you're still very much taking art courses they for example I took digital Poetics so as a part of that course um which was a poetry class or a class on digital poetry I took a class on programming sound as well where we would learn um the programming software uh what was it um I'm blanking on the name I know we also use max as a software um but uh yeah we would it's a lot of programming for artists and designers too um it doesn't have to be a lot of programming but the introduct introductory course primarily uses processing which I actually mentioned during the presentation so I'll put a link to that in the chat um but yeah other than that it's a very flexible program too you have to take one introductory course and one research project but other than that you can take whatever courses they offer to count towards it and all the courses are on their website that I linked in the chat so this is I mean we've answered this one a little bit um you know throughout the presentation and and talking about you know applying for EFS kind of but um if you are if you're interested in a department like interior design um but maybe expand this to even animation or or working specifically in digital medium um is it important to also um include um you know to quote the question here hand painted elements or um I'll expand it to to like traditional medium um in a portfolio um May you do not so yeah so students just to summarize applying as a first year you do not apply directly to a major um so yeah we don't need to see specific things in your portfolio uh whatever major you put as intended on the common application is not utilized By Us in any sort of of way shape or form during the portfolio review we uh apply you are applying to the school generally into that experimental Foundation studies program so we do like to see variety we do like to see that you're working outside of your comfort zone we don't need to see any specific Pro approaches um unless you're applying as a transfer student uh but again first year students um uh trying to think of how else I could say it uh you just you do not apply directly to a major uh one thing I want to clarify too is the the question I also saw interior design we don't offer interior design instead we offer interior architecture which is very different um than uh interior design and uh I can include a link to that in the chat as well um but R interior architecture program is very much an architecture program um oh and then the last thing I was going to say too was the school you don't don't choose your major until the end of your first year at Bry so the school deems that if you're admitted to the school uh if you make it through that first year program you're ready for any program of your choice you are 100% guaranteed until the major of your choice at that point um but you wouldn't start your matri till your sophomore year so um I have a question about unfinished pieces um can we include unfinished pieces in a portfolio um and you know then add a description of kind of what you intend to make um I wouldn't recommend it um you technically can we we won't prohibit that but um I wouldn't recommend it we do want to see mostly well-developed finished work uh when we see in progress work we prefer to see process work process work is great to see but a finished piece sort of halfway through is uh not what we're looking for so I wouldn't recommend including in progress work um you know art art school portfolios is a great time to experiment you're not going to make your perfect work for that will be your staple for your rest of your life in your art school portfolio so really feel free to experiment think about unconventional Solutions how can I make this painting in a shorter period of time for example how can I make the sculpture in a shorter period of time uh finding those unconventional approaches um I think uh to sort of speed up the process would be my [Music] recommendation yeah that's a good answer um and then this is a little bit about formatting so um could we put two sketches in one slide if they're of a similar genre um yeah um sure yeah I've also seen students have a video of them flipping throughout their uh Sketchbook that's okay to submit as well just if you do that I wouldn't recommend um including your entire Sketchbook I would really limit to just the strongest sketches in that scenario but sure um also if they are of a similar approach I would recommend including one or the other whichever one you think is stronger you know I think carefully curating your portfolio is um good to think about uh so that would be my recommendation but if the two sketches show very different qualities if they show different skill sets or different thinkings then that's okay to include both of them yeah and then one thing I will say too is that like sometimes we'll see um you know kind of students grouped together works on one slide so they'll put like all their figure drawings on one slide or like all their observational drawings on one slide um that we definitely discourage you from doing um keep you know keep kind of thinking about it as like one slide is for like one piece of artwork um so in that way we don't yeah things get really crowded really easily so um it's a little bit confusing to look at when there's multiple kind of things going on on the slide to an agree more just sharing this uh example to reiterate everything alj's saying oh and then there's um kind of a clarification so not about a question that we answered a little bit ago about um unfinished work and the person says not an unfinished final piece but like process work um of going through the idea um I'm so sorry could you repeat that question okay um so the question before was is it okay to you know to submit unfinished or you know work in progress and the person clarified to say not an unfinished final piece but submitting process work is is submitting process work okay yeah so main process work is absolutely okay um just I wouldn't recommend more than say two to three process pieces in your portfolio I would encourage you to still include at least 12 well-developed finished pieces in the portfolio but aside from that sure um the process images I encourage are processes that are unconventional you know if you built your own drawing tool if you learned a lot through the process of creating your process or sorry creating your process work and your final outcome is very different from that that's exciting for us to see essentially like nonlinear approaches maybe you create one composition you keep working it over and over again and then you land on a final one uh and the final piece that's cool to see um a example of a process that isn't as exciting for us to see is if we see someone draw out their composition then execute the same exact composition via painting because that's a very linear approach we can usually figure that out just from seeing the final work you know everyone on the admissions committee are all artists we all have U experience working as artists so um yeah I I wouldn't recommend that kind of process but uh creating your own drawing instrument uh showing more experimental approaches go for it and then going off of that um a question came up should process work and the final work be in the same slide um sure uh that that's fine just um no similar to what uhj was just saying please don't include more than uh two to three images in a single slide um we would much uh prefer to see the video slideshow that I recommended earlier um you can upload a video with each photo one after another of maybe I in this case I'd recommend the finished piece first and then showing some of the process images afterward that way we can scrub through the the piece and see it as large as it possibly can be and then is it preferred to show a variety of work that isn't my best work rather than multiple similar works that I find are my best um I would find a balance between the two um we do want to see your best work uh quality is more important than quantity I think it depends on the quality of the variety as well um um even when we are when we say we're looking for variety we're still looking for strong work uh within your experiments within trying different things also to um you know feel free to really uh yeah I would recommend building up your skill set in the areas that you think are we you're weak within uh we comparatively weaker within but um yeah feel free to uh um sorry it's so early for me I'm still Gathering my brain um yeah just keep experimenting um keep developing your skills within the areas that you aren't quite as confident in that doesn't mean that you have to do things that you don't want to do you know um but I'd still encourage you to do things that you're excited by also bring your skill set to other areas too like I've seen kind of like why measure with photography how could your photographs become sculptures how could they maybe you collage them onto found objects and now they become sculptures maybe if you're into creating animations maybe you project your animations into different spaces and now becomes an experiential three-dimensional piece you know there's always ways you can take your strengths and bring them to other mediums it doesn't need to be one Ceramics piece one painting piece one architectural piece you know mixed media is also wonderful to see and then this is a question um if you live in a bit of a conservative country is it fine if some of your pieces reflect who you are or should they be in line with your country um they do not need to be in line uh with your country um I would encourage you yeah to reflect have your work reflect who you are if you want to make commentary on your country go for it that's totally uh okay um but uh yeah uh we we do want to see um that you're exploring your personal interest first and foremost with your work and is text description allowed in the portfolio um yes uh just not on the slide itself uh there is a place to include text descriptions when it comes to descriptions I have a few recommendations one is to please keep it short you know we have uh we review thousands of portfolios every year uh we have to go through them fairly quickly so I uh do not recommend lengthy descriptions um I once saw a student upload their description as a three-page image within the portfolio um please never never never do that just there's a reason that there's a character limit within slide room for your descriptions um and then my other recommendation is to really give use the descriptions to give us additional context about the work if you choose to do so um don't feel as though you need to write descriptions I've seen amazing portfolios with no descriptions at all and I've also seen amazing descript amazing portfolios with descriptions it's really at your discretion but um my favorite descriptions are ones again they provide additional context maybe there's a reference to a cultural holiday that you're not 100% sure that the committee will understand the reference uh feel free to include information about it there maybe you created your own drawing instrument in that scenario i' recommend including a photo of the drawing instrument but um uh that's another reason you could uh insert that information in the description uh also use the descriptions to credit collaborators too if you worked with anyone else that's another place to do that and um yeah it's uh just to summarize it's allowed but not required and then there's two questions that I'm going to sort of just answer um because they're not you know super kind of related and I'll I'll post some links in the chat um so a question about your personal statement um again this is focused towards the portfolio so we won't really go into that here but we do have some application prep webinars um that go into the college essay um and those can be found on our Ry YouTube page which I I just posted poed in our chat you can you can search application prep Series in there um and then a question about portfolio days if we have any um you know left for the season um we had our last one um you know for this application season um last night and so um you know getting a live review from us is no longer possible um but you can get a review from us through the aad um you can upload your portfolio um through this site that I will be posting in the chat as well um and we'll we'll email you um feedback through there um so just some quick shoutouts to some other other offerings that we have um and then a little bit and then a question to answer could you talk a little bit more about Sketchbook page submissions like what are you kind of looking for in sketches um what do you usually see are they sketches for final pieces or are they separate from final pieces um they can be either for final pieces or separate from final pieces if they are for final pieces uh I go back to what I said about them um showing nonlinear processes showing experimentation showing that you're learning through the process of drawing and sketching before creating your final piece so seeing different iterations compositions that is more helpful for us to see um or say a composition that's may be a little different from the one you landed on uh but they can be sketches on their own too they can be images from your Sketchbook uh sketch so Sketchbook Pages um one thing that I I like to see as a Reviewer is different approaches from your final works so for example a lot of students are a little less precious about the Sketchbook as they are about their finished work they might uh work a lot faster within their Sketchbook and um you can absolutely uh show different forms of Mark making because of that uh sometimes the mark making will be a little bit looser the approach is a little looser and uh seeing that different kind of approach is excuse me often exciting for us to see within uh sketchbooks so yeah that would be one of my recommendations and then uh draw from life you know um practice strong and your Sketchbook uh fill out compositions as much as possible even in your Sketchbook one thing that not a lot of students uh think about in their Sketchbook um is composition sometimes they'll just throw things around uh the entire page think about how they sit within the border of the page think about how all of your different drawings can work together to create one composition that's exciting for us to see they don't need to necessarily uh relate conceptually to each other but just thinking about how they're placed and scale and size and stuff is important do you prefer to recruit students who already have an excellent ability or students with average ability but having great potential that's a good question um I would say both but there's often crossover between the two you know I don't it's rare that we'll see someone who um were really excited about their potential um but they don't show a lot of technical capability it does happen sometimes um but depending on the capacity of that uh that could affect their admission what I mean by that is um we want to make sure that we feel as though they're prepared for Rd we want to make sure that they won't struggle uh once they get here within their drawing and spatial design and all these different courses that they have to take um but uh potential is hugely important for us though we want to see creative unconventional approaches absolutely would you agree with that LJ or yeah definitely yeah and I think too like yeah sometimes that stuff is like hand inand um yeah yeah and keep in mind technical capability doesn't always mean drawing realistically too um that was one of the things I want to emphasize in this presentation was uh ex strong formal skills can look like so many different things too uh that's um if you want to learn more about that just reat the presentation we'll have a link to portfolio tips on the YouTube page as [Music] well yes yeah definitely um this question this next question I'm G to kind of um gear into a different direction I guess I'm not entirely sure of the intention but um the question is is coherence of the artworks included in my portfolio or diversity more important which we've talked about you know experimentation and variety of of medium but um you know we got a lot of questions about thematic diversity or um you know is it okay to work in a theme um so if you could talk about that a little bit yeah um your work uh that's actually one of the very few areas where we don't have any preference at all when it comes to theme it's totally up to you if everything's thematically coherent great if every single piece dives into completely different themes subject matters Concepts also awesome equally as awesome for us so it's totally up to you within that regard we have no preference when it comes to a theme we're mostly just concerned that your work is uh really specific to you as an individual yeah yeah there's some there's so many different reasons why we get interested in making work too so that can be just working in one theme or something too totally yeah and keep in mind what we look for is different than say AP and ibr um where they they do want to see a theme um but uh yeah we what we look for is a little different we're just more trying to see your autistic profile as a whole let's see okay how is the portfolio weighted when applying to the brown risty program um it's I would mostly be concerned about risty with the portfolio um the way the brown risty dual degree program works is you apply to each School individually and then uh the two schools will share a list of who's been admitted to both schools and then there will be a brown risty dual degree committee that reviews those applicants so you do need to be admitted to Rd individually first as well as brown individually first um so yeah there's the what the Dual degree committee uh looks about and thinks about with portfolios isn't any different than what the Ry admissions uh committee thinks about with portfolios to the best of my [Music] knowledge okay that is all of the questions that we've received so far um we still have about five minutes with anybody has any other ones now is your chance type them in the Q&A chat box it's a rare opportunity to have two admissions officers available to answer your questions immediately so definitely I'm trying to think if I have any and I don't think that I I can think of any right now totally yeah I'm trying to think some as well um there are uh recordings of this presentation the portfolio tips on the uh uh YouTube page that elj put a link to in the chat too if you want to rewatch this presentation yes yeah this isn't really a question but um I don't know we both have done it before um this person says I don't know why I'm really nervous about getting into into uni into school yeah I mean I was too when I was in high school I'm not sure if uh you relate LJ um but yeah it's a it's a stressful process and that's why we're here to help and answer your questions absolutely um it is stressful but uh you know I've um it's uh once you're in University you're there too and you can always transfer later on yes let's see um for graphic design specific projects what type of projects would you recommend um what is strong you know for graphic design um graph so one thing I want to encourage with design work is to still think about everything that I mentioned in the presentation that might on Surface seem geared towards drawing and painting for example Mark making texture um scale lighting all of these things are just as relevant with graphic design work as they are drawing and painting um so that would be my number one recommendation is to really kind of internalized think about that um think about how you can utilize all these different approaches and I'm not saying every single piece has to have uh lots of texture in your graphic design work uh lots of lighting in your graphic design work but still consider how they can be shown in unconventional processes and also think about uh how your graphic design work can um be really specific to you and really show uh yeah again unconventional processes I know I keep saying that over and over again but it's because it's important um uh one artist I'd recommend checking out is Oris alumni is Jenny holer um she's a sculptor who utilizes text in a lot of interesting and exciting ways and thinking about projection and electronics with the use of text so as far as like typography graphic design goes um she's not a graphic designer but I think she's a amazing person for uh people who like creating graphic design to look at yeah that's a good yeah I like that reference um is it possible that a strong portfolio and Essay can overcome academic backgrounds yes um it is possible but within reason so what I mean by that is we if there's significance concern in your application that you wouldn't be successful in your liberal arts courses then um that will uh that would be most important to us as we look through the application uh we still want to see that you're keeping up with your grades what I'll say is if you are concerned about your grades if you're concerned about your GPA um if we see improvement over time that means a ton to us if we if even if you have a low GPA early on but we see you're contining improving from year to year that's very very important to us and can have a big uh effect on the admissions decision but you know if you have one C here or there in AP Calculus uh that you know I would't be too concerned a uh um you're applying to art school after all and I think a strong portfolio could outweigh um some transcripts that students might have have concern over upit yeah definitely well for this we don't have any more questions and for the sake of time um maybe we'll we'll end it here um thank you so much Zach for conducting this webinar today I did put our email in the chat too um if you continue to have any questions you know later today or or even months from now um you can you can reach us there at admissions risd.edu cool awesome thanks elj thank you very much for assisting thanks everyone for joining and asking all the questions I hope it was helpful uh as alj mentioned feel free to reach out anytime and best of luck everyone have a great day bye