The education team wanted to establish connections with rurally isolated families with children under 5 in the village of Longvernal. Treasures for Toddlers encourages parents with under 5s to take part in art based activities at their local playgroup using the collection as their inspiration. A local freelance educator, Chrissie Weltike, leads the sessions.
The Bowes Museum identified the local community as non-visitors. To encourage these audiences a sculpture project was devised where the local families would design and create a ‘story tree’ based on collection items, for the Story Garden. Local artist David Gross ran the sessions. A celebration event with local storytellers marked the unveiling of the final piece which was featured in the local press.
This intergenerational project sees 15 year six students from an isolated school working on a reminiscence project with 10 visitors at Midsomer Norton Age Concern Day Centre. These sessions focus on portraiture and reminiscence and are lead by local artist and poet Claire Williamson. The memories of the Day Centre visitors and the Holburne’s collection are used as their inspiration.
Waddesdon Manor identified the local Pakistani community in Aylesbury as non-visitors. A group of 13 Muslim girls from Aylesbury Ghosia Mosque attended five sessions with local artist Pippa North. Pippa helped the group to create silk paintings and movie posters using items from the collection and a Bollywood movie filmed on location at Waddesdon as their inspiration. An exhibition of their work was held during a celebration day at Waddesdon Manor.
For more information on the above, go to Booking and Contact Information for details about getting in touch with the museums.