SHEEPFOLDS AND PAINTING AND DRAWING

Thorncliffe School, in Barrow in Furness, hosted three days of workshops with local visual artist John Hall. Twenty four Key Stage 4 students from the Art GCSE group took part and the programme started with a talk by John about his own work and a site visit to see Andy Goldsworthy's two folds at Mungrisdale. The Art Department were able to run the project over three consecutive days and make use of a large hall near the school to enable concentrated work to be produced on a large scale.

The experience of drawing and collecting information on site in very poor weather conditions - wind and heavy showers - presented the students with a new opportunity to extend their normal classroom experiences. Both the artist and the teacher felt that the outdoor sketching challenged the usual preciousness of the students' drawings and allowed them to develop confidence in attempting large-scale pieces of work.

Many of the final images employed mixed media drawing, painting and collage techniques, depicting the isolation and monumental qualities of Andy Goldsworthy's work, and reflecting the texture and tonality of John Hall's painting style and the dramatic light effects and earthy colours of the Cumbrian fells.

The individual pieces produced formed part of each student's GCSE coursework, but the collective body of work was also exhibited to the public in an impressive exhibition at the Barrow Dock Museum in January and February, 2001.

Artist John Hall
Contact teacher Jim Lowe, Head of Art. Tel: 01229 894605

Photographs: John Hall at Thorncliffe workshop; finished collage piece; exhibition of work at Barrow Dock Museum.