An Illawarra art collective has not let funding cuts scupper its ambitions.
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The Licorice Allsorts artists met while taking night art courses at West Wollongong TAFE. They will host their fourth exhibition this weekend at the Old Wollongong Courthouse, the first since their course was axed at the beginning of the year due to TAFE funding cuts.
"We were studying for a Certificate III in Visual Art; we were one year into a three-year course and they completely cut it," group organiser Ann Clarke said.
Since then, the group has met sacked TAFE teachers for self-organised classes in their own time at the Old Courthouse and Wollongong City Gallery. The artists were pleased to be learning again but the situation was not ideal.
Only isolated classes such as drawing, painting or ceramics could be offered and as the classes were not accredited, students could not achieve formal qualifications by studying them.
"We can't access subjects on art history or cultural studies," Ms Clarke said.
"They are mandatory for a diploma or certificate, so it's impossible for us to get a qualification."
Ms Clarke said the band of 16 artists began staging their own exhibitions because TAFE did not offer them the same opportunities as daytime students.
"Night students were not given the chance to exhibit at the TAFE gallery, so we organised our own exhibitions," she said.
Licorice Allsorts' fourth collection, a range of oil paintings, acrylics, photography, sculpture, and prints, opens tonight at 6pm. The exhibition runs until Sunday afternoon. Entry is free.