ARTEXPRESS comes together through the efforts of many people, including the Visual Arts teachers, who mark the HSC Bodies of Work, the individual galleries, which assist in curating the exhibitions, and officers from the NSW Department of Education & Training and the Board of Studies NSW.
A total of 8,551 students in government and non-government schools submitted a Body of Work for their Artmaking component of the Visual Arts Examination for the Higher School Certificate in 2005.
As far as possible each student's entire Body of Work as submitted for examination is represented. In each of the venues Bodies of Work on display will include works that are conceptually connected, where ideas are elaborated and reiterated, and where meanings make significant references and register on a number of levels. We view technically refined and discerning works, together with other works that appear to be less resolved, within the same Body of Work. Nevertheless, these apparently less resolved pieces make an even more powerful contribution to our understandings of the students' thinking and actions in making art.
The marking process
Bodies of Work from schools, mostly from the Sydney metropolitan area, are sent to the Visual Arts Marking Centre at Homebush Bay to be marked. Bodies of Work from the remaining metropolitan schools and all country districts are marked in each school by visiting teams of markers.
Two teams assess each Body of Work by referring to marking guidelines, prepared in response to the new Standards Referenced Framework HSC. Guidelines are expressed in terms of the knowledge and skills demanded by the task. The guidelines focus on the conceptual and material practice of the student, as represented in his or her Body of Work.
Samples of work from five ten-mark levels in each media area are established to create visual Schemes with accompanying written comments (derived from markers' comments to a set of questions). Schemes are correlated across the media areas to ensure comparability and consistency. Copies of these Schemes are used to brief all marking teams. Marking teams then assess all the Bodies of Work against the Marking Guidelines and their knowledge of the Marking Scheme - i.e. the scales and comments. The whole process takes months to complete.
Bodies of Work come from all media areas described in the Visual Arts syllabus:
- drawing
- graphic design
- painting
- printmaking
- photography
- designed objects and environments
- textiles and fibre
- sculpture
- documented forms
- ceramics
- digital media
- film and video
- digital animation
- interactives
- collections of works
Selecting works for ARTEXPRESS
In 2006 there were 934 works in the selection pool. Altogether 10,847 individual pieces of artworks were handled during the pre-selection process for ARTEXPRESS 2006. Particular criteria now become important and care is taken to select works representing both government and non-government schools from across New South Wales. The final selections reflect the range of media submitted and must work as a coherent exhibition across the various venues.
In order to differentiate each of the separate ARTEXPRESS exhibitions, the curators agreed on a specific approach to the ARTEXPRESS selection for each venue.
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