The Kent Institute of Art & Design (KIAD, often ) was an art school based across three

campus A campus is traditionally the land on which a college or university and related institutional buildings are situated. Usually a college campus includes libraries, lecture halls, residence halls, student centers or dining halls, and park-like se ...

es in the county of Kent, in the United Kingdom. It was formed by the amalgamation of three independent colleges: Canterbury College of Art, Maidstone College of Art and Rochester (Medway) College of Art. In turn KIAD merged with the Surrey Institute of Art & Design, University College on 1 August 2005 to form the University College for the Creative Arts at Canterbury, Epsom, Farnham, Maidstone and Rochester. In 2008, this gained full university status and became the University for the Creative Arts. KIAD offered

further education Further education (often abbreviated FE) in the United Kingdom and Ireland is education in addition to that received at secondary school, that is distinct from the higher education (HE) offered in universities and other academic institutions. I ...

, higher education, postgraduate and part-time courses at three campuses, in Canterbury, Maidstone and Rochester.

History

The National Savings Scheme at work in Canterbury, England, 1941 D5014

Maidstone College of Art was founded in 1867, and Rochester College of Art in 1886. The origin of Canterbury College of Art lies in the private art school founded by the Victorian animal painter

Thomas Sidney Cooper Thomas Sidney Cooper (26 September 18037 February 1902) was an English landscape painter noted for his images of cattle and farm animals. Biography Thomas Sidney Cooper was born in St Peter's Street in Canterbury, Kent, and as a small child ...

in 1882, and known then as the Canterbury Sidney Cooper School of Art. After Cooper's death 1902 his art school continued until 1935 when it was taken over by the City of Canterbury Education Committee. The Education Committee took on all the assets and liabilities of the art school and until 1972 it remained housed in the building that had been Cooper's home and studio in the centre of Canterbury. It then moved to a new site on the New Dover Road. Canterbury College of Art was by this time operating under the aegis of the newly reorganised

Kent County Council Kent County Council is a county council that governs most of the county of Kent in England. It is the upper tier of elected local government, below which are 12 district councils, and around 300 town and parish councils. The county council h ...

, along with the art schools at Maidstone and Rochester. Ravensbourne College of Art located in

Chislehurst Chislehurst () is a suburban district of south-east London, England, in the London Borough of Bromley. It lies east of Bromley, south-west of Sidcup and north-west of Orpington, south-east of Charing Cross. Before the creation of Greater L ...

was also in an informal relationship to these three, by virtue of being technically in the county of Kent, but under the administrative control of

Bromley Borough Council Bromley London Borough Council is the local authority for the London Borough of Bromley in Greater London, England. It is one of 32 London borough councils. History There have previously been a number of local authorities responsible for the Bro ...

rather than Kent County Council. It was the three colleges under the direct control of Kent County Council that went on to form KIAD in 1987. The founding director of the Kent Institute was Peter I. Williams, an artist in his own right and former principal of the Lincoln School of Art and Medway College of Design, Rochester, who ran the institute from 1987 to 1996.'Obituaries, Peter Williams: Art educationist whose college vision became a reality', ''The Guardian'', Wednesday 11 January 2006, p. 31 He was instrumental in gathering the three art colleges together, but reframed from amalgamating them into one single campus because he recognised their individual cultural connections within their communities. A notable feature of the Canterbury College of Art at this time was the number of former- Leeds College of Art tutors and students who started working there. This arose from Thomas Watt being made Head of Fine Art at Canterbury in 1968, Watt having previously been a teaching colleague of Harry Thubron at Leeds College of Art. Under Watt the radical Leeds teaching methods developed by Thubron were imported into Canterbury through the employment of other artists from Leeds, such as

Stass Paraskos Stass Paraskos ( el, Στας Παράσκος; 17 March 1933 – 4 March 2014) was an artist from Cyprus, although much of his life was spent teaching and working in England. Early life Paraskos was born in Anaphotia, a village near the city ...

, Tom Pemberton and

Dennis Creffield Dennis Creffield (29 January 1931 – 26 June 2018) was a British artist with work owned by major British and worldwide art collections, including the Tate Gallery, The British Museum, Arts Council of England, the Government Art Collection, T ...

. Another key member of staff was Eric Hurren, who led the Foundation Course in Art and Design from 1963 to 1988. The merger of institutions to create KIAD was not without controversy and was effectively imposed on Kent County Council by the central government's National Advisory Board for education. This was in spite of concerted opposition from the County Council, the colleges concerned, the local Member of Parliament, David Crouch, and a large number of figures in the art world at the time, who petitioned Parliament. In the government's original proposal the intention was to merge the colleges and then close at least one of them. The creation of KIAD was, effectively, a compromise solution that saw duplicate courses at the different sites closed, but the individual colleges themselves remained open.Hansard Parliamentart Debates, (HC Deb 26 October 1984 vol 65 cc911-78). One of the ironies of the history of Canterbury College of Art is that the original home of the art school, in Cooper's house, again became a place for teaching art in 2004 when another educational institution in the city,

Canterbury Christ Church University , mottoeng = The truth shall set you free , established = 2005 – gained University status 1962 – teacher training college , type = Public , religious_affiliation = Church of England , city ...

, used the building to house its fine art faculty.

Notable alumni and staff

Students

* Wale Adeyemi, fashion designer * Jal Patel, Published Author * Charlie Adlard, comic book artist * Justin Bere, architect *

Billy Childish Billy Childish (born Steven John Hamper, 1 December 1959) is an English painter, author, poet, photographer, film maker, singer and guitarist. Since the late 1970s, Childish has been prolific in creating music, writing and visual art. He has le ...

, foundation 1977 (who was banned from the Rochester site at Fort Pitt in the Medway Towns in 1981 for publishing "obscene" poetry) * Babette Cole, children's writer and illustrator *

Sharon Bennett Sharon File (born as Sharon File in 1958 in Eccles, Kent) is an English illustrator, designer, artist and author. Life and work From head girl at Aylesford School, Sharon attended Medway College of Design (now University for the Creative Arts), ...

, English illustrator, designer, artist and author *

John Copnall John Bainbridge Copnall (1928–2007) was an English artist best known for his abstract expressionist painting of richly coloured stylised realism, often on a grand scale. He was also a teacher of painting for twenty years at the Central School o ...

, abstract artist and teacher, * Wendy Dagworthy OBE, fashion designer, Royal College of Art professor * Roger Dean, artist * Marcus Dillistone, Royal premiered film director, music producer Athens 2004 Olympic opening and closing ceremonies * Tracey Emin, 1999 Turner Prize nominee * Clive Evans, known as "Clive", London couture designer of the 1960s *

Lizzie Farey Lizzie Farey (born 1962) is a contemporary willow sculptor and artist based in the Stewartry in Galloway, Scotland. She designs and creates wall sculptures and 3D forms using her own grown and harvested willow, as well as other local woods such ...

, wood artist * Brian Froud, fantasy artist *

Gordon Frickers Gordon Frickers (born 1949 in Beckenham, Kent, United Kingdom) is a marine artist based in Plymouth, Devon, but also paints in France. Frickers was the first marine artist to be exhibited at the European Parliament in Brussels in May 2011. Edu ...

, marine artist * Lasse Gjertsen, videographer * Jackie Hatfield, artist and writer * Tony Hart, TV personality * Bob Holness, broadcaster * John Joseph Haldane, philosopher, broadcaster *

Bryan Ingham Bryan Ingham (1936–1997) was an English artist born in Yorkshire who specialised in painting, etching and sculpture. Early life Bryan Ingham was born at Preston on 11 June 1936 and raised at Totley in Yorkshire's Calder Valley, in one of it ...

, etcher, painter, sculptor * Tony Kaye, director * Timothy Edwards, cricketer *

Andrew Kötting Andrew Kötting (born 16 December 1959) is a British artist, writer, and filmmaker. He made numerous experimental short films, which were awarded prizes at international film festivals. '' Gallivant'', was his first feature film, a road/home fil ...

, film maker, writer, artist * Ástþór Magnússon, Icelandic businessman and peace activist, a perennial candidate for the office of President of Iceland. *

James Mayhew James John Mayhew (born 1964 in Stamford, Lincolnshire) is an English illustrator and author of children's books, storyteller, artist and concert presenter/live art performer. Early life and education The son of RAF pilot John Byrne Mayhew and ...

, writer and illustrator of children's books * Karen Millen, fashion designer * Bill Mitchell founder of site-specific theatre company Wildworks. *

Humphrey Ocean Humphrey Ocean (born 22 June 1951) is a contemporary British painter. Early life Humphrey Ocean was born Humphrey Anthony Erdeswick Butler-Bowdon, on 22 June 1951 in Sussex, England. He went to Ampleforth College and in 1967 went to Tunbridge ...

, artist *

, artist and founder of the Cyprus College of Art *

Jayne Parker Jayne Parker is a British artist and film-maker. She studied sculpture at Canterbury College of Art and Experimental Media at the Slade, where she is now Head of Graduate Fine Art Media. Her films have been shown in art galleries and museums in ...

, artist *

Toni del Renzio Antonino Romanov del Renzio dei Rossi di Castellone e Venosa (Toni del Renzio) (15 April 1915 – 7 January 2007), an artist and writer of Italian and Russian parentage, was leader of the British Surrealist Group for a period. He brought to the Br ...

, artist and writer * Zandra Rhodes, fashion designer * David Shaw, painter, silk-screener, tutor * Richard Spare, artist *

Stuckist Stuckism () is an international art movement founded in 1999 by Billy Childish and Charles Thomson to promote figurative painting as opposed to conceptual art.Charles Thomson, Bill Lewis, Philip Absolon, Charles Williams, Sanchia Lewis *

Julie Verhoeven Julie Verhoeven (born 16 May 1969) is a British illustrator and designer who has collaborated with brands such as Louis Vuitton, Versace and Peter Jensen. While she is recognised primarily for her work in fashion, she has also contributed illus ...

, illustrator/artist and fashion designer * Ray Davies, musician

Staff

Tutors include: Ian Dury, Stephen Farthing, David Hall,

A. L. Rees Alan Leonard Rees (18 May 1949 – 28 November 2014) was a British writer and teacher about film, who advised the Arts Council, the British Film Institute, the Tate Gallery and the Arts & Humanities Research Council. He was the author of A Hist ...

and David Hockney. Artist Mike Chaplin was a technician in the early 1970s, and Quentin Crisp a model at Maidstone College.

References

External links

University for the Creative Arts website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kent Institute of Art and Design University for the Creative Arts Education in Kent History of Kent Education in Canterbury Borough of Maidstone Education in Medway Defunct universities and colleges in England