Curious about studying Fine Art with Foundation Year - BA (Hons)at Bucks New University? We've gathered all the key details—entry requirements, modules, fees, and more. Hear from real students by checking out reviews, or take the next step by booking an open day to explore it for yourself.
Bachelor of Arts (with Honours) - BA (Hons)
High Wycombe Campus
Full Time
Sep 2027
4.0 Year
Inspiring facilities
As student studying fine art, you’ll be homed in a dedicated studio space. This will serve a space where you can explore your craft and cultivate your artistic practice. In addition, you'll enjoy access to a wide array of Art & Design resources, enhancing your creative journey.You can take advantage of our Fashion and Textile workshops, equipped with state-of-the-art facilities including screen printing, and letterpress equipment, knit machines and Dye Lab. Additionally, you'll have the opportunity to explore your creativity in our 3D design workshops, where you can work with various materials such as ceramics, metalwork, and woodworking.You'll also be supported to develop your photographic, as well as moving image techniques, in our industry-standard photography studios and wet darkroom. Additionally, you’ll be able to edit any video and photographic work with the latest Adobe Creative software in our dedicated Mac media suites. Our team of specialised technicians and demonstrators are readily available on-site to provide support and share their expertise whenever you require assistance.
Discover your career pathFine art offers a remarkable opportunity to embark on a global journey, from art galleries and exhibitions to immersive experiences and commissioned projects. Regardless of where you envision your artistic endeavours taking you, with BNU guidance, you can transform your creative ideas and concepts into a thriving career. Being a part of the Art, Design and Performance School at BNU means you'll benefit from a hands-on course grounded in practical experience and complemented by contextual studies. You'll have the opportunity to engage with various courses across the university in collaborative projects. This will enable you to establish a diverse network, reflecting the realities of the real world.Our Fine art degree empowers you to become a versatile artist, cultivating a distinct artistic identity and honing the research methods that best align with your unique creative vision.
Industry connectionsYour lecturers will provide you with current insight into the subject, as well as develop your learning through research, collaborative projects, industry briefs and external opportunities. This will help you refine your new skills, methods and knowledge to become critically engaged with your practice.Due to connections with the Buckinghamshire Cultural Strategy Group, you could have access to involvement with professional exhibition or curatorial projects in collaboration with some of the county’s galleries and museums.
What will I study?Whether your passion lies in ceramics, woodwork, metalwork, sculpture, photography, video, painting, drawing, or any other artistic medium, your degree empowers you to craft compelling pieces that transcend individual media. As an artist, you are encouraged to flourish through collaborative projects with your fellow students, actively engage with the community, and partner with external organizations to expand and share your creative practice.During your time studying this degree you’ll engage with cutting edge approaches to material and visual practices, as well as those that challenge the boundaries of the field. This is done through conceptual, theoretical, cultural, and ethical frameworks that underpin the contemporary arts, through practical workshops, studio-based practice and self-managed projects. This course is also offered as a four-year programme, including an initial Foundation Year. The Foundation Year is a valuable stepping-stone, enabling you to enhance your academic study skills, bolster your confidence, and identify your individual strengths and areas for growth as you prepare for progression into the fine art classes and undergraduate program.
In this first module dedicated to intermediality and interdisciplinarity, through a series of workshops, you’ll be introduced to the range of resources and technical spaces available at the University. You will use these resources and spaces to explore a range of media and approaches to making and develop creative enquiry techniques through experimentation.
This module introduces you to key theoretical terms and themes relating to the history of art and contemporary practice. You’ll engage with the work of artists, working with a number of mediums and in a variety of contexts, and map your work in a network of references relating to historical and contemporary art production and criticism.
Digital technologies such as the Internet, virtual reality, computer generated imaging (CGI) and artificial intelligence have, unsurprisingly, revolutionised the arts and creative industries in the last few decades. In this module you are introduced to a variety of digital technologies and digital approaches to making creative work in new and innovative ways.
This module will introduce you to core ideas on collaborative and collective practices to understand their contemporary agencies and possibilities. You’ll also be familiarised with how the creative sector operates through strategies of collaboration and how they are often tied to the idea of participation.
You’ll further instigate learners to understand the significance of contemporary expanded practices, blending different media and disciplines. This module will develop to a greater extent the skill needed to study Fine Art at university, grow learner independent studio practice to become a thinking practitioner.
On this module you’ll be presented with key global debates which impact our lives and could influence your creative practice and positions as creatives in ever-changing professional industries. Through research and critical reflection, you’ll explore these issues which may be related to sustainability, politics and other ecological or socio- economic factors, and respond to them creatively using your chosen discipline-specific practice.
This module aims to support the employability of learners by encouraging them to consider and evaluate their fine art practice within a professional context, and to promote an understanding of the key considerations required to support practice.This module uniquely informs learners about the structures and organisations which underpin professional practice within the creative industries. It develops an understanding and awareness of the breadth and depth of the potential role of the artist as practitioner, and how to prepare oneself in order to survive and thrive in the cultural and commercial worlds beyond education. Learners will be informed by various models of practice that seek to further enhance professional ambition and communication.This module provides learners with a solid framework for professional development, which will equip them to undertake further self-directed initiatives and advanced exploration in their Level 6 Professional Practice module.
In this module, you will explore sustainability holistically through an ecological approach and creative thinking. You will investigate a local, national or international socio-cultural or political issue, developing a project that seeks to use contemporary fine art as a platform for activism and social change.
Much contemporary artistic practice has no obvious 'visual’ or ‘material’ such as sound art, performance art, and many forms of socially engaged and discursive art. In this module, you will develop your own practical work in response to the concept of artwork that goes ‘beyond the visual’. You can choose to interpret the themes of this module in a way that fits your developing concerns as an artistic practitioner.
Socially Engaged Practices can be collaborative, participatory, and involves people or, often, communities. This module will develop your knowledge of core ideas about how the creative sector operates and the core values underpinning much contemporary professional arts practice.
The Research Strategies module is designed to introduce you to preparing and planning for your practice-based report in Year 3. Through a series of thematic lectures and seminars, the module provides a framework for you to understand and explore cultural knowledge, concepts in fashion, textiles, costume design and the broader field of art and design and popular culture
Through workshops, seminars, and one-to-one supervision tutorials, this module provides you with the support required for writing your contextual report on practice. This self-directed theoretical/critical and evaluative piece of written work consists of a detailed account of the critical references surrounding your final major project.
This module will enhance your understanding and appreciation of the roles, relationships, and responsibilities that can play a major part in progressing and sustaining your professional practice. Extending your work in relation to career aspirations, you’ll develop visual, verbal and written presentation skills to support communication with employers.
This puts focus on knowledge and skills to support professional practice in the visual arts, design and the creative industries. You’ll develop in-depth knowledge of your chosen field of practice, which will support the critical appraisal process and inform the social and professional context for your work.
You are provided with an opportunity to sustain the creative dialogue between your research and subject-based practice, enabling you to establish your professional and creative identity through a self-directed brief/proposal.
The aim of this module is for you to complete a proposal for your final major project, evidencing how it will be developed in response to substantial research on the sector and reflection on your previous practical outcomes.
Foundation Year
4.4Bucks New University (BNU) is a student-focused university based in High Wycombe, with over 130 years of educational his...
