Below is the speech to be given by Sir Alan Langlands today at the London graduation of 37 Duncan of Jordanstone art students.
Good afternoon everyone.
And a very warm welcome to the University of Dundee's first ever graduation ceremony in London. Our graduands, their parents, partners and friends are all welcome and we appreciate the effort you have made to be here.
The Duncan of Jordanstone School of Art and Design has always taken part in the New Designers Event which is held every year just round the corner at the Islington Business and Design Centre - this is an important showcase for the work of our graduands, a launch pad for your talent and an important conduit to job opportunities, exhibitions and commissions.
It is important that you are here but it is also important to mark your achievements and degrees success - the culmination of years of hard work in Dundee. Today we bring a little bit of Dundee to you in the form of our distinguished Chancellor, Sir James Black: the new Dean of D of J, Georgina Follett and Deputy Principal, Bill Barr, himself a former Dean and Head of Design.
I cannot think of a more appropriate setting than this for your Graduation - it is a little smaller than the Caird Hall in Dundee but surely inspiring from a design point of view. The Estorick Collection is a unique collection of Italian futurist works, the legacy of Eric Estorick - an American political scientist - and his wife Salome - a textile designer and business woman. It includes masterpieces by Balla, Boccioni, Severini and Russola - a unique and very personal collection of two people who fell in love with Italian 20th Century Art. And today we have a special treat - a rare opportunity to see the work of Giorgio Morandi.
I will come back to Morandi shortly but let me now turn to the real stars of today - our graduands. Your degree show at D of J that I attended a couple of weeks ago was stunning. You are all here on merit. In working towards your degree you have shown both scholarship and creativity, a powerful combination and I have no doubt whatsoever that many of you will share in the New Designers awards and prizes later in the week. This is not just blind optimism on my part - you have had many successes this year already. For example:
- you have achieved three commendations for graphic design from the International Society of Typographic Designers and Thomas Crielly was awarded the prestigious Vincent Steer Prize for the most outstanding piece of multimedia design across all international submissions
- Niall McCormack received a commendation from the British Design and Art Direction Annual Student Awards and Stewart Spence was the winner of the Corporate Identity award
- A number of students from Printed and Constructed Textiles received awards at the annual Bradford Textile Society Awards and several final year students had their work featured in the International Textiles Magazine, some even made the cover!
- Denise Dye, Heather Buchan, Katie Gillon all received prestigious awards for their work in Printed Textiles
- Three students Sangeeta Sathe, Emma Johnstone and Rachel Miller were selected to participate in the Polish 5th Biennale Baltic Miniature Textile Exhibition and Suzanne Holland and Seonaid Bell were shortlisted and exhibited in the Simon Jersey Tapestry Awards
- Zoe Hornby, Holly Verrill and Emma Johnstone have been offered postgraduate places at Goldsmiths and Sara Insh at the Scottish College of Textiles.
The future is bright for creative thinkers and the creative industries. The University of Dundee will continue to play a key role in the development of Scotland's creative industries but in doing so we will keep faith with our traditional values and our commitment to excellence in teaching, scholarship and research. The Visual Research Centre and Dundee by Design, both located at Dundee Contemporary Arts, have been hugely successful and over the next few years we will be developing incubation facilities for the creative industries, enabling the City to further its growing international reputation for new, successful start up businesses in the visual arts, design and imaging.
Today is the beginning of a great adventure for our graduands. Morandi, whose work we see around us, was a student in Bologna, he paid special attention to the French influences of Cezanne and Braque in his early work, he spent time in the army and as a primary school teacher, he exhibited his still lifes and landscapes across Europe, he flirted with cubism, he was an excellent print maker and indeed returned to Bologna in 1930 as Professor of Printmaking. Above all he found personal fulfilment in the classical composition of simple objects - the red vase, the jug and the coffee container which appear time and again in his still life paintings.
Today I wish you continued success, diversity and fulfilment in your lives. I congratulate you on your success and I congratulate your parents, partners, friends and all staff of D of J for motivating and supporting you so well through years of hard work. Scholarship and creativity is a very powerful combination - go well and please maintain your contact with D of J and the University of Dundee.
Alan Langlands
Principal and Vice Chancellor
10 July 2001