Learning at Artist Proof Studio is not limited to what happens around the printing press. During Term Three, second and third-year students stepped outside the Studio to engage with museum collections, exhibitions and artists' books, while members of the APS team took their own printmaking knowledge into another learning environment through a workshop at Tshwane University of Technology.
These exchanges form an important part of how students begin to understand their practice within a much larger art world. Technical training remains central to the APS curriculum, but encountering artworks in museums, understanding how they are presented and seeing how other artists have developed their practices gives students another way of thinking about their own work.
A Different Kind of Book
On 17 and 18 July, second and third-year students visited Wits Art Museum and the Jack Ginsberg Centre for Book Arts as part of the Term Three Visual Literacy programme.
At the Jack Ginsberg Centre for Book Arts, Special Collections Librarian Ciara Struwig introduced students to (Un)charted Territories, an exhibition she curated around cartographic elements in artists' books. The visit introduced students to books that move beyond conventional formats, where paper, structure, image, text and materials all become part of how an artist communicates an idea.
The Centre houses one of the Southern Hemisphere's most significant collections of artists' books, built by Jack Ginsberg with works from South Africa and around the world. For printmaking students, the collection offers an opportunity to consider what happens when print moves beyond a single sheet of paper and becomes part of an object that can be folded, bound, constructed and handled.
The visit also continues a long relationship between Jack Ginsberg and Artist Proof Studio. In 2025, he established an annual student award recognising excellence and innovation in book arts projects by APS students through the Jack Ginsberg Centre for Book Arts Awards and The Ampersand Foundation.
Looking at a Practice Over Time
At Wits Art Museum, students joined a walkabout of Theresa-Anne Mackintosh's NOW IS NOT FOREVER, led by Bougaard, Education Museum Officer at WAM.
Bringing together more than thirty years of Mackintosh's practice, the exhibition gave students the opportunity to encounter how one artist has worked across animation, painting, drawing, sculpture, photography and digital media over the course of a career.
For students still developing their own practices, seeing that progression is particularly valuable. An artistic practice does not have to remain tied to one technique or material. Ideas can move between mediums, change direction and develop as an artist continues to work.
From Learning to Sharing
While APS students were learning from collections and exhibitions outside the Studio, APS was also sharing its own technical knowledge with another generation of printmakers.
Khumo Ramaila, assisted by Lehlohonolo Mapheto, facilitated a two-part aluminium etching workshop for 27 second and third-year printmaking students at Tshwane University of Technology.
The workshop introduced students to environmentally sustainable, non-toxic aluminium etching through practical demonstrations and hands-on production. Students completed the first stage of their plates during the sessions, while materials were left with the department so that experimentation could continue after the workshop.
This exchange is particularly important within printmaking, where knowledge is often developed through making alongside someone who understands the process. Techniques are demonstrated, tested and adapted, then carried into the next print, classroom or studio.
Creating access is an important part of APS education, giving students opportunities to experience museums, exhibitions and collections that broaden their understanding of the arts. It also creates pathways for APS graduates to share their knowledge with other students, extending skills and opportunities beyond the studio and into the wider arts community.