Leeds College of Art Update!

Hi everyone! A lot has been happening recently, hence my absence from my blog, so I wanted to share a quick update about my funding for college, the kind donations I have received and recent course change to keep you up-to-speed!

First of all I want to say a massive thank you to everyone who donated through my GoFundMe page; I received an amazing £810 altogether and to have received such a large amount of money in such a short space of time means the world to me. I also received £1,130 in physical donations from family members and service users at Henshaws - bringing my final total to £1,940! I'm so incredibly grateful for everyone's generosity which will certainly help my Guide Dog and I feel much more comfortable financially, in terms of accommodation and travel, during my first year at the Leeds College of Art. Being in a different city, away from home, is not going to be cheap (travel expenses and accommodation alone will come to over £4,000!) and you have made such a difference to how this next chapter in my life is going to start out.

As you may recall, I wanted to start college education right at the beginning, starting with a Diploma in Visual Arts (or Level 2) course before moving onto my A Level, Degree and even Masters in the future. I received a phone call recently from my tutor that he would prefer me to undertake the A Level course, rather than the Level 2, as I already have an A* in my GCSE's and he felt the course wouldn't be of much benefit to me. Despite not being my first choice, I agreed to the offer to join the A Level / Level 3 course and have responded to my Letter of Acceptance!

I'm now in the process of applying for a 24+ Advanced Learning Loan for the course, as it costs £3,980 for the year, which is of course more expensive than the Level 2 course I originally wanted to undertake.

With accepting the A Level offer I now have a Visual Studies summer project to complete over the next few weeks before enrolling on September 2nd and starting the course proper on September 10th. The aim of the project is to visit an exhibition and research with unorthodox materials and text to explore new methods and understanding of form, shape, mass and surface area. I am basing my project on the WithDraw exhibition, by reportage illustrator George Butler, at the Imperial War Museum North (blog post coming soon!).

Thanks to my kind donations I have booked my accommodation through a website called homestay.com, where I will be staying with a "host family" until Christmas. This option is much more affordable to me, at £24 a night, and I will be staying with John, Thery and their two little girls until the festive period. Tami and I will be staying in the furnished basement room for 3 nights a week and I very much look forward to meeting my second family and staying with them over the next few months!

I'm really excited for September and this new chapter in my life, and again want to say a huge thank you to everyone who donated to me! I shall keep you all updated on my enrolment day and first few weeks of college when the time comes!

Bright for Sight 2014

Wear Bright, Bake Bright, Create Bright!

It's October 9th which marks the start of Bright for Sight 2014!

Bright for Sight is Henshaws Society for Blind People's biggest and brightest annual fundraising campaign, helping to raise vital funds in order to support people affected by sight loss and other disabilities. Bright for Sight is taking place on October 9th, 2014, which is World Sight Day. I would urge anyone and everyone to get involved with Bright for Sight to raise as much money as possible for Henshaws and to help make a difference to the lives of people like me.

There are lots of ways to get involved with Bright for Sight! Whether you decide to Wear Bright or Bake Bright, the fundraising part is really simple. Bright for Sight can be done at school, work or with friends - it's entirely up to you! To register your interest and to order your BFS fundraising pack, please click here.

Send pictures of your activities to brightforsight@henshaws.org.uk or share them through Henshaws' social media websites at Facebook and Twitter using the hashtag #BFS. The best ones will be shared with the Henshaws online community!

My Fundraising Project!

Over the past few months, I have been very busy working on my secret Bright for Sight fundraising project. I can now finally reveal that I have been creating Bright for Sight Bunnies and Bright for Sight Bracelets, to be sold at the Manchester Resource Centre over the course of the next week.

The bunnies are available in 7 colours; green, yellow, baby pink, hot pink, red, purple and blue, and retail at £5 each. The bracelets are of a fishtail design, made from various loom bands, in combinations such as pink and purple, green and yellow, orange and blue, red and yellow, pink and blue - and even rainbow gradients!

The idea for my project was constructed last year during the previous Bright for Sight event. Service users, volunteers and staff were wearing bright and baking bright - but I noticed a lack of crafted items to help raise money and provide a commemorative, keep-sake item to remind people of the money they donated to Henshaws.

I wanted my items to be very colourful, to tie in with the Bright For Sight theme and I conducted a survey earlier this year to service users who partake in the groups that I attend to determine the most popular colours, price and animal shape. Aftter the initial research was carried out, it was time to construct a prototype to use as the foundation for all of my crocheted creations!

The bracelets were created over the summer, after I fell in love with the looming craze and discovered how tactile a craft it can be when they are made on the fingers. It's easy to keep track of the bands being used and fun to play with all kinds of colour combinations; from pastel, to neon, to mis-matched! These retail at 50p each.

Bright for Sight Film: #NoMirrorMakeUp Challenge!

I was very kindly asked to take part in a #NoMirrorMakeUp Challenge earlier this September to raise awareness of visual impairment and the barriers that are faced on a day-to-day basis with simple tasks, such as applying make-up, where sight is taken for granted.

As I only have 10% central vision in my left eye, and a little bit of light perception in the other, I cannot see my own reflection clearly enough in a mirror and have to apply my make-up in the tactile way of just using my hands and feeling around to make sure I've covered all of the main areas. I label my make-up using the RNIB PENfriend, an electronic voice-lebelling device, and arrange my products on a flat surface in the order that they will be used so I can keep track.

The challenge is designed to draw attention to how vision can be taken for granted and how difficult a barrier it can be when you can't see your own progress in a task that relies heavily on sight.

You can view the finished result of my video below!

You too can take part in the #NoMirrorMakeUp Challenge!

Simply grab your camera and set to record, apply your make-up without using a mirror, upload to your social media websites with the hashtag #NoMirrorMakeUp and then donate either online or via text by texting HSBP14 with the amount you wish to donate to 70070.

You can read more about the Bright for Sight campaign, as well as stories from the service users who have benefitted from the fundraising event, by visiting the official website here!

Artwork at the RNIB Pears Centre

I recently donated a piece of my artwork to the RNIB Pears Centre in Coventry, after they got in touch with me via e-mail in late February. I restored the piece and sent it off, and the team have kindly sourced a frame to display it in and have also displayed it alongside my biography and short paragraph about the carousel piece produced during my GCSE art course in 2005.

I've now been sent a photo of the display to share with you all! I'm so thrilled with how it looks, and hope everyone at the RNIB Pears Centre enjoys it too. A big thank you to Liz Thomson and Sophie Edge for organising the photo to be taken and for displaying the piece. I'm very appreciative indeed!

The official RNIB Twitter account also tweeted about my donation!

Kimberley Burrows, our Young Illustrator 2014, has kindly donated a painting to RNIB Pears Centre – thanks so much! http://t.co/DSCUy8bBE5
— RNIB (@RNIB) May 16, 2014

My First Brailler!

I purchased my first Brailler on Thursday and it arrived today!

I've been learning Braille through the Fingerprint course books at Henshaws Society for Blind People, since August 2013, and have wanted to have my own Brailler ever since learning how to use one at the Manchester centre 7 months ago.

My mum recently discovered an eBay listing featuring a lovely turquoise Brailler, with the money from the auction going to the 4SIGHT charity in Sussex. I didn't think I was going to be able to win as I had my cane training that day, which overlapped with the item's ending time - but my mum was sneaky and had put a bid on it for me without my knowledge. When I came back home from my mobility training, I checked the eBay listing to see who had won - and it was me!

I'm thrilled to bits with my Brailler, it matches my bedroom perfectly (which is colour co-ordinated in pink and turquoise) and the money has gone to a good cause. It was also sent with a dust cover and a large pack of cartridge paper. I've already been Brailling lots of different articles today; including the basic alphabet and short forms, a passage from one of the Fingerprint course books I'm currently studying and even a shopping list for my mum!

Artwork Donation to the RNIB Pears Centre

The RNIB Pears Centre got in touch with me through Insight Magazine, after reading my article on Daily Mail Online and seeing my interview with Granada Reports, asking for me to donate a piece of work to their specialist learning centre in Coventry.

I thought I would donate my GCSE carousel composition from 2005, which has previously been displayed in my high school for a number of years as well as in Sale Town Hall, so it can be displayed once again.

It needed a bit of restoring though after being displayed quite a lot throughout the years! When I received it back from my high school a year and a half ago, the metal decorations and sequins were hanging off or weren't there at all, the paintwork was chipped, the glitter was dull, and so on - so I've spent the past week returning it to the condition it originally in.

It's now completely restored and packaged up to be collected by a courier tomorrow, to then be sent to the centre in Coventry. It will be displayed in a frame alongside a small biography of me as well as some information about the piece which I was asked to write. You can read them both below:

Biography

Kimberley Burrows was born with congenital cataracts and has been severely visually impaired all of her life, now with only 10% vision in one eye. Kimberley visited Great Ormond Street Hospital in London throughout her childhood, and would draw with the colouring pencils or crayons that were on display in the waiting rooms, or use the various paints and crafts in the playroom before having her operations. Her favourite subject was always art during primary school and high school, and she took it for her GCSE's - receiving an A*.

Kimberley began illustrating in 2011, and produced some drawings of Paddington Bear which she shared online with a fan page. This eventually led to her meeting the creator, Michael Bond OBE, at his home in London in 2012 and gifted him some of her Paddington drawings, which he now displays in his study.

She is now the RNIB's Young Illustrator of the Year for 2014, and will be producing a piece of artwork for each monthly issue. Kimberley recently received press attention for winning the award, and featured in her local newspapers - the Salford Advertiser and the Manchester Evening News, on the Daily Mail Online website, as well as appearing on ITV News and Granada Reports.

Henshaws Society for Blind People have asked Kimberley to produce a composition to be displayed in John Lewis at the Trafford Centre, to celebrate their 150th birthday in 2014, which she is now working on.

The Project

This composition was one of four that Kimberley produced for her GCSE coursework, from 2004 - 2005, at Flixton Girls' High School in Urmston, Manchester. It is based on a traveller art theme and features painted flowers seen on narrowboats, along with a carousel from a traveling circus and details all of its intricacies.

The composition uses a variety of mediums including watercolours, acrylic paints, coloured pencils, stained glass paints and pastels. After the piece was completed, it was displayed in Sale Town Hall before being displayed in her high school for many years. Kimberley has now donated it to the RNIB Pears centre to be displayed once again. Kimberley was awarded an A* in her GCSE's.

I've asked for a photo to be taken of the displayed artwork when it's framed alongside my biography, so I'll be able to share it here when it's up.

Edit: You can now see a photo of my artwork displayed at the RNIB Pears Centre here!