Visit to Munch exhibition

Report by Ms Steinert

A group of 22 4th, 5th and 6th year pupils visited the Munch exhibition at Glasgow University’s Hunterian Gallery today. The exhibition featured many of the artist’s most renowned prints including “The Scream”, a black and white woodcut print that is an iconic image many people will know.

We were given special permission to sketch in the gallery and each pupil chose a print to study in depth and then produced their own version in pencil. Many of these drawings were exceptional and the pupils worked very hard to capture the Munch imagery. An exhibition of the pupil’s work will soon be on display in the Art Department for all to enjoy. Many thanks to the Hunterian, which gave the Our Lady’s group special permission to photograph the pupils at work in the gallery.

Afterwards the pupils viewed the Hunterian Gallery’s permanent collection and Mackintosh room before wandering over to the Hunterian Museum, where pupils became engrossed and fascinated by the work of Dr William Hunter and his wide-ranging collections which are displayed there.

Upper school pupils also took the opportunity to take photographs in the university’s atmospheric cloisters for their Higher Art and Design Expressive unit.

The visit was a huge success with many compliments from university staff and the bus driver on the pupil’s mature and enthusiastic behavior- well done!

 

Timorous Beasties

Report by Ms Steinert

Higher and Int 2 Art and Design pupils were asked to go to the Timorous Beasties shop located on Great Western Road in Glasgow’s West End to see the hand printed wallpaper and textile designs firsthand.

The shop features the designs of the design duo Paul Simmons and Alistair McAuley who create very modern wallpaper designs that have a subversive edge like their modern take of an 18th century Tiolle design: The Glasgow Tiolle. This design features some classic Glasgow architecture mixed up with images of the problems of substance abuse and modern urban life in Glasgow. They are very much influenced by William Morris but have a unique and raw edge to their work which the pupils enjoyed seeing first hand.

Every pupil that went to the shop collected a sample of a different wallpaper pattern and Ms Steinert was pleased that they all had made a real effort to see some contemporary design work for themselves-well done class! You can see some of their designs on their website.

 

Christmas Card Competition

Report from Ms Steinert

This year's winning Christmas card

All S1 pupils take part in this exciting competition to produce the official Our Lady’s High School Christmas card as part of their Art and Design classes.

The entries this year were of an exceptionally high standard with all pupils working very hard to produce some great images of angels based on Renaissance paintings which they interpreted in either a snow scene or with a colourful background.

The winning entry was produced by Kayley Roarty (1C), and the 4 runners up are: Leah Holmes, Lauren Harvey, Lorna Mitchell, and Colette Rodgers. All five designs will be created into cards and sold in packs of 5. These cards will be on sale at the Christmas concert on December 9th.

As so many entries were outstanding this year, we have also printed a selection of the other images as stickers for decorating envelopes.

 

Open evening – part 2

Many thanks to all the families who came along to Our Lady’s last night, despite the atrocious weather.

Over 200 people toured the school to view our facilities, meet the staff and find out more about the school.

Activities included having a go with the computerised embroidery sewing machines in Home Economics which were already set up and running so that P7s could see some designs. Visitors also had the chance to operate the ordinary sewing machines, trying to follow a line on a sheet. Mums reminisced about their own Home Economics classes while the Dads complained that they never had the chance to do Home Economics at school at all.

Various resources were on show in the Library Resource Centre, including our famous Roman helmet, used for the Ninth Legion investigation, examples of mindmapping and rebus puzzles, Comic Life software and our course, our blog, Our Lady’s Latest.

The PE department set up gymnastics displays, while Art and Design showed off screen printing techniques.

We welcome comments about the school, or last night’s event, which can be added by clicking on the “Comments” button above.

 

Blast from the past

The Art Department welcomed back former pupil, James Gardner, today. James is in his final year at Gray’s Art School, RGU, Aberdeen, studying textile design.

James offered to come along to OLHS to share some of his expertise with our current pupils. Classes had a chance to see his own textile designs, including woven textiles, computer generated designs and silkscreen prints.

In addition, James kindly demonstrated some techniques working with batik wax and drawing with their opposite hand (i.e. with left hand if right handed and vice versa) to create original artwork.

Every class was enthused by James’ work and demanded that he return as soon as possible. Most classes were so motivated that they took their work home that night to complete it in their own time.

 

Grand Designs

An exhibition of the work of Christine Burns, S6 will officially open on Wednesday June 4th in the SMT Base.

Christine has just completed her Advanced Higher Art and has kindly donated 5 acrylic canvases to the school. The paintings are figurative and really quite special- you might even recognise a few people in them!

The Art Department have invited all staff members to this opening show on Wednesday between 1:10 and 1:40 pm.

The exhibition will also be open to parents at the S1 Parents’ Evening that evening, so please come along and sign Christine’s comment book.

 

Art Festival

Pupils from Our Lady’s High School, Motherwell took part in the Art Festival organised by The Youth Arts and Literary Guild.

This Annual Exhibition showcases the work of North Lanarkshire most talented young artists. Some 26 secondary schools supported this very worth while event.

It was a very successful exhibition, sponsored by Patersons of Greenoakhill Ltd, showing at Airdrie Town Hall from Monday 18th February until Wednesday 20th February 2008.

Mr Jakusz, Principal Teacher of Art at OLHS, said, “Everyone was so impressed by the talented youngsters from North Lanarkshire. The pupils from Our Lady’s really enjoyed taking part in the exhibition. Hopefully the Art Festival will be an annual event for many years to come.”

Mr Jakusz also urged members of the public to visit next year, promising that they would not be disappointed.

 

Visits to Kelvingrove

Second year pupils recently visited Kelvingrove Gallery and Museum to support their art and design work.

Using treasure hunts and worksheets, pupils explored the whole gallery, focusing on the Art Nouveau and Impressionist rooms, but also had an opportunity to follow their own interests: the most popular exhibits were the Egyptian and the prehistoric Scotland rooms.The pupils had to select one item to sketch, and selected a wide variety from George Walton’s stained glass to Mackintosh’s domino clock; from a Dyson hoover to a 1920s Milngavie sky train.
Other popular attractions included Elvis with his halo, the Spitfire and a host of hovering heads.

 

Edinburgh Art Trip

Standard Grade and Higher pupils had an opportunity to see some of the best artwork from last year’s SQA submissions on a recent trip to Edinburgh.

The exhibition at the National Gallery of Scotland was full of intriguing ideas and designs, from landscapes of birch trees, to self-portraits, amazing still-lifes drawn in pastels on black paper and funky, futuristic jewellery designs and book jacket illustrations of fantasy dragons. Covering Standard Grade, Intermediate and Higher, the artwork included paintings, sculpture, fashion designs, collage, drawings and furniture design, etc.

In the afternoon, we toured around the main gallery in three separate groups. Each group looked in more detail at artists such as Gauguin, Frans Hals, Titian and William Dyce. The guides asked each group to look for the symbolism or techniques involved in each piece of work. The pupils very quickly proved their ability to notice small but important details, and more importantly, how these led to an understanding of the artist’s intentions.

One painting in particular, William Dyce’s “Francesca da Rimini” includes a gnarled hand right at the edge of the canvas. The whole group was surprised to discover that the painting had actually been damaged in the past and part of it removed, leaving just the mysterious hand.

In the Standard Grade exam, pupils are shown paintings or other artwork and asked to comment on them. This trip was an excellent opportunity to practice with some of the best works of art in Scotland.

 

Christmas cards

The Art and Design Department have completed the annual Christmas card competition. This year’s theme was “angels”.

The winning pupils for the card pack are:

Amy Burnett
Gary Duffy
Corey Ewing
Nicole Mathieson
Courtney McDougall.

Courtney McDougall’s design was selected as the official school Christmas card. Congratulations to all S1 pupils who competed in the competition. The designs this year were outstanding.

Examples of the pupils’ designs are on view in the school foyer and you can also see the winning designs on the school website. You can see larger images of each of the winning designs by clicking on this link.

The cards went on sale on the 5th December, and sold out within 24 hours! Thanks to everyone who purchased cards and watch out for next year’s designs.

Please leave your thoughts below on the cards.