Participating Artist & Organiser for Goldsmiths' BA FAHA Alternative Degree Show

***Official Statement of Intent*** 16 Goldsmiths students, set across 6 exhibition venues, with a public programme of events at 1 venue. The Alternative Degree Show is an act of solidarity and protest, a hopeful eye turned towards the future of the arts industry. Born out of a questioning of the traditional degree show period, set against the backdrop of macro and micro sociopolitical events such as the Global Pandemic and its impact on arts education allowed us to question what a degree show means and, more importantly, who it serves. The reinvigoration of the Black Lives Matter movement coincided with allegations of institutional racism at Goldsmiths. The recent Troy government initiative to halve funding for arts education, and our own Senior Management Team's misrunning of the university have led go extensive strikes by overworked and underpaid staff. These issues have impacted us directly, and are symptomatic of a wider disregard for the value of creative education. We recognise the precariousness of working class students on arts/creative university courses, and want to actively resist the notion that art education is either valueless or elitist. We will not be showing in the Goldsmiths Degree Show, in an effort to highlight these failings, and create a new space for reimagining. Ultimately, these events and circumstances have presented us with a space for questioning. We want to reframe the meaning of a 'degree show' within a wider context of contemplating 'what kind of artists do we want to be?'