In the second half of the Summer Term the whole school, from Pre-school up to Year 6, took part in an arts-based project based on the Caneletto painting, Regatta on the Grand Canal, that is hanging in the National Gallery, in London.

Over the course of a week the painting was slowly revealed a bit at a time, giving the children small windows into the picture to focus on, ask questions about, and imagine what the rest of the painting might look like. Once revealed the classes decided which direction they would take their learning in, with some classes focussing on the boats, and others on the buildings, flags and window hangings. Some classes researched what Venice was like at that period in history and made masks for a Venetian masquerade ball, and others took a wider focus and found out more about Italy as a country. 

In their art lessons the children worked together to create items for a whole school exhibition, producing an amazing range of artworks from a feltwork recreation of the painting, including Venetian-Masquerade-inspired masks, a 3-D recreation of the painting (using junk modelling), pencil sketching, Andy Warhol inspired pop art boats, flags and banners and water colour paintings.

All of their work was them displayed around school ready for our pop up one-day exhibition. It was wonderful to see so many people enjoying the children’s creativity. Thank you our Year 6 guides!