Over three days in November on the 10th, 11th and 14th , Year 9 travelled to London to visit The National Gallery.  During the action packed day students gained an opportunity to view a collection of  18th to early 20th Century paintings which included the famous compositions entitled ‘Sunflowers’ by Vincent Van Gogh and ‘Surprised’ by Rousseau.

A wonderful variety of sketches were drawn by Year 9 to capture the variety of styles used by different painters.  The gallery provided a fantastic opportuity for students to experience observing from life the rich, vivid colours of oils and the scale at which artists such as John Constable, George Stubbs and Georges Seurat worked.

The 'Fighting Temeraire' by Joseph Mallord William Turner became a source of great interest to several Year 9 boys as well as Room 34, which was used as a location within the James Bond film, Skyfall. 

The work produced will be incorporated within the current project which focuses on ‘Portraiture’. During the afternoon students enjoyed an inspirational and fascinating talk given by specialist educators who discussed and explained in-depth three specific compositions produced by different artists which included Rubens and Hans Holbein. Students were shown how to analyse subtle features which were often incorporated to symbolise anger, death, love, grief, intelligence, wealth, eternal life or torment.  Colour, tone, shape and the stance of figurative poses were discussed to reveal the story communicated by the artist which often revealed a twist to how the painting initially appeared.

Each visit was a huge success and a fantastic collection of work was produced by Year 9, thank you to all the staff who assisted in making the trip so enjoyable.