Every Dandelion you see today grew from the seed from another dandelion. Maybe the dandelion seed was blown by the wind, or maybe it was blown last year by one of the children from Sherdley Primary.
The seeds that grew last year’s dandelions might have been blown by another child who’s grown older and gone to high school now. Their dandelion’s seed might have been blown from it’s stem by a parent when they went to school. Dandelions can grow in all sorts of places and live for more than 10 years, so maybe, just maybe the dandelions we see today can be traced back to a child who was here when Sherdley Primary opened 50 years ago.
This is the premise on which a whole-school programme of arts activity was based to celebrate Sherdley Primary School’s 50th Anniversary in April 2021. Using something that we can see now in the present, to celebrate the past and make wishes for the future. Children from every class were invited to make prints onto a postcard and to find a dandelion clock and make a wish for Sherdley Primary’s future, with each class from Y1 through to Y6 taking part in additional art workshops that led to the designs for an anniversary mural and garden in the grounds of the school.
Delivered in partnership with Cultured St Helens these workshops included observational drawing of natural forms, stamp-making, experimental drawing using gestures, shadows and spotlights and workshops plus workshops by partners UC Crew which connected Hip Hop Arts and its values to those of the school community.
Pupils hands were covered in chalk and charcoal as they created larger scale drawings of each other’s shadows expressing emotions, seed-filled sculptures were constructed, sketchbook pages filled with drawings of flora and fauna that was gathered from nearby greenspaces, and spray can techniques were practiced in the sunny spells between April showers.
All of these elements were brought together into a design that uses stenciled elements that I have used in my previous works such as Keep the Pavement Dry and Migrate combined with the graffiti art skills of James from UC Crew. This was complemented by the beginnings of an anniversary garden in front of the mural sown with perennial flower seeds, dandelion clock sculptures containing more seeds and golden stones with drawings of dandelions edging the planting areas.
