AP 3-D Art and Design
Build a 3-D portfolio — sculpture, ceramics, installation, jewelry — through a sustained investigation.
How this exam works. There is no exam day. You submit a digital portfolio: a Sustained Investigation of 15 images with written responses about your inquiry, plus 5 Selected Works with written justifications.
The vocabulary of technique and, more usefully, the scoring criteria. Students routinely lose points on the written responses by describing what they made instead of what they were investigating, and that is a fixable, learnable thing.
The portfolio itself, which is a year of studio practice. No study tool substitutes for making work, documenting it well, and revising it.
What to do instead. Photograph work properly as you go, keep a process journal from day one, and write the inquiry question down early — the written responses are far easier when the thinking already exists on paper.
Sustained Investigation
- Framing a Guiding Inquiry in Three Dimensions13 min · 3 objectives
- Practice, Experimentation & Revision with 3-D Elements and Principles14 min · 3 objectives
- Documenting 3-D Work, the Written Evidence & Academic Integrity14 min · 3 objectives
- Generating & Researching Ideas in Three Dimensions13 min · 3 objectives
- How an Inquiry Evolves Through Making: Failure, Iteration & Decision Points14 min · 3 objectives
- Materials, Processes & Structure in Depth15 min · 3 objectives
- Documenting 3-D Work: Viewpoints, Light, Scale & Detail14 min · 3 objectives
- Reading the Sustained Investigation Rubric & Running a Year of Slow Processes15 min · 3 objectives
Selected Works
- Choosing 5 Works That Show Your 3-D Skills13 min · 3 objectives
- Materials, Processes, Ideas & Writing the Selected Works Responses14 min · 3 objectives
- What "Skill" Means in Three Dimensions14 min · 3 objectives
- Choosing & Sequencing the Five Works14 min · 3 objectives
- Writing the Selected Works Responses & Academic Integrity13 min · 3 objectives