Bryan Parsons (b.1978) is an artist that has engaged in a number of interdisciplinary projects. For 20 years he has developed his practice to encompass, painting, screen printing, performance, video, interventions and installation work; many of these projects have also involved explorations into educational models and ways of rethinking structures that frame artistic production and development. In the last 10 years Parsons has also been working as an Art and Media Teacher specializing in conceptual and contextual development as well as improving independent learning and critical thinking skills. Parsons has worked as part of a number of collaborative groups since 2003, including Sunday League, Fiveplustwo and Measure by Measure as well as taking part in other collective shows and events. Much of his work is concerned with the processes involved in artistic production, whether this is related to the development of ideas and concepts or engaged in research and learning to enable the fulfilment of the idea. In this way many connections have been drawn between the process of creating artistic responses and engaging with educational models this comparison has revealed that learning and creativity often needs to expand beyond the restrictions of the institutions that frame the activity.  

 

Bryan Parsons received his BA (Hons) in Fine Art Painting from Cheltenham and Gloucester College of Higher Education in 2001 where he began a painterly exploration of light and perception which expanded from painted representation to creating experiential encounters with myopic visions of light. What resulted was a shift away from the subject matter to an engrossing engagement with experimental materials and processes. The following summer he spent working at the Cypress School of art, Pafos, Cypress before spending a gap year working, researching and generating ideas; after which he studied at The Slade School of Fine Art, UCL between 2002 and 2004. During his time at the Slade he began working with Eddie Farrell, Corinna Till, Gil Pasternak, Emma Hart and Graham Hayward where an interest in discursive practice and collaboration built into a shared desire to challenge the principles behind he grading of Fine Art work in the context of a course and exhibition context. The outcome of this approach was to produced a collaborative combined Final Exhibition where, numerous undefined and unlabelled collaborations occupied a singular exhibition space. Meetings, discussions and events were given the same value as videos, prints and projections and a working space evolved over the full duration of the Final show. While this may have created some difficult discussions with the assessment panel the Group was awarded the Adrian Caruthers Memorial Award.

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The group took part in a number of events which led to a series of lectures at the Slade School of Fine Art and the Architectural department at Westminster university and also included a lecture event within Gary Woodley's Exhibition to launch the opening of the Chelsea Space, Chelsea College of Art. The success of these events led to the successful AHRB funded application as part of East International 2005. While group members came and went, the discussion was opening up to a larger network of artists which created opportunities to be part of or set up exhibitions and events with larger collectives, amongst these were the Day of Damage Goods Event at the Whitechapel Art Gallery, 2005, a series of Sunday League performance events around London and the opportunity to be part of Eddie Farrell and Michael Wedgwood's Shytstem Project.

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The focus of exploring education through artistic practice never dissipated and as part of a group called Fiveplustwo; Bryan Parsons, Eddie Farrell, Michael Wedgwood, Natalia Charogianni, Patrick Loan and Graham Hayward were invited by Bruce McLean and Will McLean to explore educational and artistic responses to their design for a new primary school in Dalry, Ayrshire. The project involved creating videos and activities that connected the ideas inherent to the design of the school with learning opportunities, creative ideas and architectural project updates. Between 2005 and 2007 a number of visits, communications, presentations and activities culminated in a week long launch event that brought together video, performance, learning and measuring activities to celebrate the opening of the new school and to introduce the students to many of the ideas and features that were important to its design. Work from this project was included in Process of Living exhibition, City Gallery, Leicester, 2008 and to accompany this Bryan Parsons, Natalia Charogianni and Patrick Loan created the School on Paper workshop installation under the group name MeasurebyMeasure. This project put the focus squarely on learning and exploring through the process of play and experimentation as being important if not more important than finding the shortest route to creating a final product or outcome. This was a multimedia project with participants from 0 to adult, the work was all created and documented in one space, and the work was incorporated into the ever growing paper space.

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In 2008 Bryan Parsons trained as  teacher at the Institute of Education and worked as an Art and Media Teacher at BSIX Sixth Form College, London until 2019. While working here he was responsible for designing and delivering on a number of courses from Level 1 Art and Media to Level 4 Foundation Diploma in Art and Design. He was the organiser of the Creative Proposal event, which led to artist Alaena Turner developing her Dinner with Picasso research project, and was liaison with Courtauld Institute of Art, Goldsmiths University, Slade School of Fine Art and Architects Association. In 2013 Bryan Parsons completed an MTEACH for the Post Compulsory Sector with the Institute of Education and passed with Distinction. His research project entitled, Teaching and Learning Strategies: Developing Autonomous Critical Practitioners in Art and Design was the beginning of an ongoing interest in student centred independent learning and he has successfully applied many of his ideas to programmes across Art and Media courses from Level 2 to Level 4.