Braddan School held a special event at the beginning of April with special guests including his excellency the Lieutenant Governor Sir John Lorimer and members of the IOM Arts Council Team to see their finished project “Journeys” which received funding from the IOM Arts Council.
Bronwyn told us a little about the project “Our school celebrates St Brendan’s Day annually and during this year’s reflection on the origin of this celebration, we asked the Manx Curriculum Team if they had any planning we could use. The team initially wrote back saying they had not heard of the saint. They then looked further and discovered that many years ago, Braddan community used to hold a larger celebration, that all the locals would attend based on St Brendan. They suggested that we could promote the story again. When we went to our local church to act out the story of St Brendan in classroom performances, we started to gather ideas to promote our community and the art that occurs through these stories”
“To do this, every class began the year with learning based on the overarching theme of ‘Journeys’. Children learned about the amang story that is told of St Brendan with his 14 monks. Stories of sailing long distances, mythical creatures, islands of giant sheep, dangerous residents and even death.”
We asked Bronwyn to talk to us about her application and what the Arts Council did to help.
How did the IOM Arts Council help you with your project?
Without the funding provided by the IOM Arts Council, we would not have had the ability to pay our artists. It meant that we felt able to develop a project more fairly, rather than just expecting hard working people to do things for free because they are artists and we are a school. It also gave us a stronger direction to complete our murals (with good quality, lasting resources); to develop an exhibition with our children’s work, and to invite our community in to see the results and raise the profile of these fabulous, talented artists.
How long did the project take from start to finish?
We applied for funding in May 2021, began with the first artist in September 2021 coming into the Year 2 and 3 class, and then all the artists came in throughout the rest of the Autumn and Spring terms. This meant that the whole school could see artists in their midst for a longer period of time and watch the development of the murals, and highlighted the importance of this project. We then invited in parents to support the classes in painting their murals. Our final phase of the Exhibition and mural walk being opened to our community took place on the 1st of April 2022.
Did you face any unexpected challenges with the project? If so how did you overcome them?
Due to lockdown, we struggled to get a written quote for the marine ply for the murals, as prices were moving so fast, that we couldn’t tie down a price. That meant that the ply wood couldn’t be included in our funding proposal. We also found it hard to locate our sixth and final artist because some artists that had been invited did not respond and because we could only ask one at a time, this slowed down the time before we would approach someone else). Sara Hogg stepped in in January, but was not able to do the mural alone, as she is a fibre artist. She asked myself to work with her, so we jointly designed the mural together – that was hard for someone who always feels she would love to be an ‘artist’ but is happier in the safety of being a ‘teacher’. Luckily, Graihagh Betteridge and other parents stepped in to paint the mural and it looks fabulous lined up with the other ones.
The artists that were asked to come into school, Leanne Mathews, Sara Hogg, Kate Summerville, Graihagh Betteridge, Felicity Wood and Janine Skelly, were absolutely amazing. They came in for much more than their two afternoons. They sent encouraging emailed and messages. They brought in their own inspiring work and encouraged our pupils so much. We feel it was a privilege to have them working with us.
