From the Head of Visual Arts

Congratulations - Grace Wesley

Congratulations to Grace Wesley in Year 8 who was awarded First Place in the 14 - 20 year old category at The Royal Easter Show for her outstanding Mosaic work. Grace also received the Standard of Excellence Award, which recognises excellence in a certain category. 

This prestigious award is not necessarily given to all first place recipients. Grace has been doing mosaic classes with Caitlin Hughes for five years as an extracurricular activity and has been entering competitions for several years honing her technical skills and knowledge. It is wonderful to see Grace being rewarded for her dedication to creative pursuits. I encourage all of you to get involved in extending your creativity every opportunity you can. 

Do an activity you have always dreamt of but never thought you were good enough. Enrol in a course today and commit to building that skill you have wanted to improve in. 

Thank you Grace for being an inspiration to us all.

Stage 5 Visual Arts Excursion  -  2024 Biennale Under 1000 Suns

On 31st May Stage 5 Visual Arts Students visited the Museum of Contemporary Art and White Bay Power Station Biennale to launch the Contemporary Art Case Study we will be doing back at school. The goal  of this excursion was to engage students on a deeper level with the power of Contemporary Art practice and deepen their understanding of contemporary art making and different cultural viewpoints. Students at BMGS will Bi Annually attend a two day immersion of Contemporary Art by visiting various sites at the Biennale and complete a one day workshop back at school with a guest artist. 

Students  from the three different Visual Arts classes engaged with two educator led tours of the exhibitions held at two different venues. This first hand immersive audience’s engagement through curatorial practice helps ignite conversations back in the classroom. Students experienced of a range cultural viewpoints help to make artwork they are studying more accessible, connecting artists own personal experience of the world to the artwork they produce. Once back at a school students will Photoshop images taken at White Bay Power Station to craft a photographic response. Students will also learn to develop their writing skills in short answer questions based on the Biennale and will move towards engaging in a well-informed manner with a wide range of subject matter from their excursion experience.  This year we will craft our exam paper to focus on specific art works from the excursion. The goal of this unit of work is to provide students with a rich experience of contemporary art practice leading into the senior years.

Thank you to all our wonderful students who are always a delight to take out of the school. We are always so proud of their engaging questions, authentic interest and manners with the general public, they are a delight to be with. We all had a terrific day and are looking forward to seeing the exciting work that is created at the end of year Art and Design exhibition  sponsored by Dr Ken Marshall 22th November.

Sally Herron

Head of Visual Arts