Carving on Churchill

Wednesday saw an early start to the day so the van had been loaded up the night before. All the stone blocks had been prepared and cut to size and all the hand tools had been sharpened and sorted for the carving workshop at Churchill Primary School in Caledon.

It was a real delight to come to such a wonderful school, in such beautiful surroundings and on such a beautiful sunny day. 

When I arrived I was meet with 24 very enthusiastic children and supportive staff that certainly made me feel very welcome.

The first part of the morning involved giving a short talk and presentation to the children on my work as a sculptor. It was also a great opportunity to show images of the 'Unity' Public Art Project and talk about the design and methods I will be using to create the large stone cogs.

I had brought with me a variety of imagery and got the children to pin it up on boards and arrange it into themes relating to the Industrial Heritage of Caledon as well as images of architectural features within the town and agricultural links to the area. From this stimulus the children then discussed and developed their ideas ready to make a small drawing. Once their drawings had been created we enlarged a section of the sketch onto a square page the same size of their carving block. The intention was to have a bold and simple design that would be symbolic of one of our themes.

Once outside the children listened attentively as I delivered a very important Health and Safety demonstration on using the tools before getting down to drawing on the stone and picking up their mallets and chisels.

Without any hesitation everyone got straight down to work. They were all naturals!

The art of low relief carving!

Everyone was working so hard and it was great to hear 24 hammers beating away and the sound of everyone giving each other encouragement, sharing their new ways of working and how their designs were developing.

Paying close attention to accurately carving what has been drawn.

A wall of twenty four relief carvings skillfully carved by all the Yr 6 Pupils at Churchill Primary School. We had a real variety of imagery from tools and spanners, stone bridges and farm animals to flowers, dresses and a violin. 

The artists and their masterpieces!

A massive thank you for the support and assistance on the day from Mrs Cartmill, Mrs Black and the Artist Eleanor Wheeler who is currently working on a Public Art Project with the Community of Middletown.