MA Illustration and Book Art portfolios

Find out how to prepare your portfolio for the MA Illustration and Book Art course at Cambridge School of Art.

What do we look for in your portfolio?

Your portfolio should:

• show examples of your recent visual practice including, where possible, work that gives an idea of the themes and areas you’d like to develop on the course
• include preparatory work like sketchbooks or contact sheets to show how you develop and resolve visual ideas
• include projects where the experimental approaches and developmental work is evident, regardless of how successful the final outcomes are. These can be more valuable points of insight than a series of highly finished pieces.

How should you present any digital work?

Standard applications

If your portfolio includes digital works, you should provide these as pdf or Powerpoint files, and any films as MP4s, saved on USB memory sticks or external hard drives. Your web and interactive work must run automatically in a browser or be available on a live domain/website. If your digital work does not open or run, then we cannot take it into account during the interview process. If it is an essential part of your portfolio you may be asked to provide alternative work through the post by a specified date.

E-portfolios/International applicants

You may deliver your portfolio digitally as a website portfolio or PDF document. We can’t accept USB or CDs in the post. All websites and file transfer services are acceptable but, in case you need suggestions, some of the more popular ones are listed below*. If your portfolio is a PDF please include your name and the course you want to study in the file name and on the PDF.

For any questions regarding this or any other aspect of the admissions process please contact your admissions officer. We look forward to receiving your portfolio.

*Previously used websites for transferring online portfolios include: Behance, Flickr, Deviantart, Carbonmade, Indexedit, Wordpress, Blogger, Blogspot, Dropbox, WeTransfer, Crevado.