LOCWS International were invited by the National Waterfront Museum to run a creative workshop on 06/06/16 for pupils from St Thomas Community Primary School, 28 children from the reception class are currently participating in an exciting King’s College London initiative called ‘My Primary School is at the Museum’.
‘The live project takes primary school classes directly into museums for their day-to-day school programme. It aims to create and evaluate a potentially symbiotic relationship between primary schools and museums that could develop into a new model of educational delivery.’
The workshop was a response to Rich White’s large commission which sits in the museum garden, on show until June 19.
LOCWS International‘s Arts Outreach Coordinator Rebecca Rendell led the workshop with help from our wonderful volunteer Amy Treharne. Luckily the weather was warm, so each of the 2 sessions were held outside with the sculpture on the grass.
First, the pupils explored the sculpture, sharing what they thought it was about, and how it made them feel. They enjoyed interacting with the work and everyone came out with unique responses.
One group decided that the doors could all lead to new world’s and secret or magical places, the other group enjoyed imaging that they were ‘Going On A Bear Hunt’ while they were exploring the sculpture, saying ‘You can’t go over it, you can’t go under it, you’ve got to go through it!’ as we all walked through the tunnel.
The groups were given cardboard boxes and drawing materials, they sat around the sculpture making drawings of the furniture in preparation to build their own version of the sculpture. One pupil interpreted a long narrow box to be perfect for his wonderful ladder drawing, another drew a magical door. Once the children had drawn on the boxes, they worked together as a group to balance and build the biggest structure they could with all the boxes next to Rich White‘s huge sculpture.
The children really engaged with the work, had fun and worked very hard during the workshops. Claire Stallwood from St Thomas Community Primary said; ‘The children really enjoyed and were keen to talk about their day when they got back to school.’
Thanks to Leisa Brynant at the National Waterfront Museum for co-ordinating the workshop.
