The Artist in Schools scheme has given our school the opportunity to select and work with a professional artist and explore new arts media, to include all art forms.

Our project is an exploration of clay primarily as a medium with 2^nd and 3^rd class. The exploration has included elements of design, working with colour, texture and differing decoration techniques while exploring the student’s own creativity. 

The project will progress with all students in the class collectively designing and contributing to the project based on nature and the environment. The project aims to address sustainability and the use of natural materials in the everyday environment. By its nature, ceramic material has connections with history, archaeology, chemistry, physics and everyday objects in our lives both artistic and functional. Any of these topics along with the artist’s own influences of nature, landscape and geology can be expected to become talking points at differing stages of the project – targeting the age group of the classroom.  

As global warming is a highly discussed and debated topic currently it is vital to teach the pupils the benefit of nature, ways to look after nature and how to do it in a sustainable way. The process of the project formation promotes consideration for the environment throughout its development and promotes forward thinking for the pupils as they consider what is best for the material and the environment in the fired product. The pupils would consider this at every stage in the journey towards a final product again reinforcing sustainability and care for the environment throughout.  

The final goal of the project is to enhance the outdoor school space, with artistic features made by the children themselves that also help to increase biodiversity in the area. The school is situated in a rural area with a vast area of space, nature, trees, play areas, pitches etc. which leaves the pupils many avenues to explore incorporating art into the school environment. This project also requires the pupils to look at the built and natural environs of the school grounds and decide on a suitable location to promote natures use of the project.