I am delighted to introduce you to the MA Fine Arts 2022 graduation show, both in the virtual form of this website and in the actual physical form of the exhibit itself. The LASALLE community is pleased to be able to welcome audiences back in ‘real’ space and time this year, as pandemic conditions begin to improve. But we would readily acknowledge that the earlier requirement of working at a distance from others necessitated students and staff to explore new ways of sharing work virtually and to become more conversant in a range of digital technologies—an experience which naturally bears upon the form of this website for starters.

Just as the shared experience of recent challenging conditions has its trace in the very mode of reproduction of these works, so too does it show itself in the general theme of this year’s exhibit: ‘faraway nearby’. You will find here a broad array of approaches, styles, and media—but also a shared curiosity about the paradoxes of new forms of isolation in conjunction with new forms of connectedness that the past two years have manifested. These graduation works take on an immediacy and cogency in apprehending the aesthetic and emotional reverberations of these novel conditions of physical distance and electronic intimacy that we have all now had to reckon with—new perceptions of the parameters of human relationships and the modalities of lived geographies.

The MA Fine Arts (for those who are new to it) is a flagship programme of LASALLE College of the Arts, which takes in a select group of students (many of whom are already established artists) each year to further refine their craft and vision in an intensive studio workshop environment. This exhibit is the outcome of the current cohort’s creative explorations, which I am sure you will find engaging and provocative—and which I do hope, if at all possible, you can come and appreciate in the LASALLE gallery space, where these works were meant to be experienced.

Lastly, do allow me to share my heartiest congratulations to this year’s graduating MAFA students on the culmination of their efforts.

Prof Adam Knee
Acting Head, McNally School of Fine Arts
Dean, Faculty of Fine Arts, Media & Creative Industries
LASALLE College of the Arts