Classroom as Studio Programme
Paul Hamlyn Foundation’s Teacher Development Fund (TDF) – Round 7 grant is to be used to fund the Arts Connect programme, Classroom as Studio. The Teacher Development Fund aims to enable teachers and school leaders to develop their skills, knowledge and experience in order to embed learning through the arts in the primary curriculum.
Working with 7 primary schools in Birmingham and the Black Country, 6 local artists and IKON, The New Art Gallery Walsall and Wolverhampton Art Gallery, Classroom as Studio is a two-year programme that has been inspired by the work of contemporary artists. It will look to develop the teaching practice of primary school teachers so that they can reimagine their classroom as an artist’s studio and develop their leadership and influence in the visual arts in their school.
The programme will embed change through teacher and artist workshops, in-school development work and visits to local art galleries. In the first-year teachers will be assigned a partner artist, a local artist who will work in the schools and with teachers to develop teaching practice and programmes of activity with children in the classroom, as part of an action research project. Teachers will be immersed in the work and ideas of current contemporary artists and be supported to take risks with their art teaching, introducing new practices and exploring social issues with their children.
In the second year of the programme each collective will be asked to use their research to create a programme of creative activity that will become part of the ongoing School Improvement Plan and embedded in the partner school curriculum.
Arts Connect are working with the partner schools because they are situated in areas where children experience the impacts of disadvantage and inequity of opportunity, for instance 89% of them are in the lowest quintile for income in the UK. As part of Classroom as Studio children will visit local galleries and artist studios, building their confidence and developing a sense of belonging and ownership in these spaces. Through investigating and working with local artists in their schools, pupils will be able to see that being an artist is a viable career pathway.
Arts Connect know that contemporary art opens up a new way of learning that is active and hands on. Contemporary art enables pupils to explore and move around the classroom, expressing their views and emotions, giving them a time to be free and to communicate in different ways.
The long-term objective of Classroom as Studio is to grow and embed arts-based learning in the school curriculum and in teaching practice. This will build sustainable capacity, supporting children in the partner schools to better develop their creativity, art skills, wellbeing and oracy with a strong collective of schools, teachers, art galleries and local artists.
Our Partners
Classroom as Studio Partner Schools
- Arden Primary School, Greet, Birmingham
- Bantock Primary School, Pennfields, Wolverhampton
- Bilston C of E Primary School, Bilston, Wolverhampton
- Dawley Brook Primary School, Kingswinford, Dudley
- Loxdale Primary School, Bilston, Wolverhampton
- SS Peter and Paul Catholic Academy, Newbridge, Wolverhampton
- Villiers Primary School, Bilston, Wolverhampton
Classroom as Studio Gallery Partners
Classroom as Studio Partner Artists
Complex Simplicity
Roz is an experienced Fashion/Textiles Designer/Maker & Visual Artist, with a wide variety of experience devising and delivering design workshops, training packages and creative projects within educational and community settings.
Complex Simplicity is a design label that has organically developed into a unique, established lifestyle brand, with Fashion/Costume/Textiles Design remaining firmly as the specialist area. The bespoke services and limited edition collections attract a wide range of private and corporate clients, including dance/theatre companies and performing artists.
Avant-Garde designs and intriguing, exploratory textiles techniques are key elements of the signature features that have become representative of designs created by Complex Simplicity. Creative boundaries are constantly pushed and exhilarating, thought-provoking creative outcomes in Costume/Interior design and Visual Art commissions are the end results.
In addition to the contemporary designs and artwork produced, upcycled sculptural forms are merely one example of how Complex Simplicity cleverly fuse their experience gained working within the design industry and creatively combines materials, techniques and inspiration from the costume/textiles/interior design sectors.
Often collaborating as freelance Creative Partner, Resident Artist/Educator, Creative Mentor and similar roles, Complex Simplicity have over 25 years experience within the design industry and bring a wealth of experience, knowledge, extensive skillset, passion and creative energy to each and every project they’re involved with.
Design projects, commissions, exhibitions and events include Interior design/Homeware ranges, contemporary artwork and a range of training and social impact opportunities that Roz is able to confidently and effectively deliver in an inspirational and creative way.
The positive impact on Mental Health and emotional wellbeing is a key, underlying and important aspect of the work that Complex Simplicity seek to be actively involved with.
Exodus Crooks
Exodus Crooks is a British-Jamaican multidisciplinary artist and educator, interested in self-determination and how it is steered by religion and spirituality. Informed by a fractious domestic life, their practice is auto ethnographical and exists in the orbit of their educational role where they work to reimagine Western pedagogy.
Their art is research focused and follows the lead of the many radical Caribbean writers and thinkers advocating for indigenous ways of living. Exodus is currently experimenting with gardening, text, filmmaking, and installation to better understand indigenous thought and tend to the breaks that occur in the human experience.
Exodus serves on a regional arts advisory board and a national artists council that advocates for the development and protection of artists and has previously exhibited and worked with Ikon Gallery, the International Curators Forum, iniva, Freelands Foundation, LUX Scotland and the National Gallery in London. They are proud to be based in heart of the Midland’s vibrant art community, working closely with local galleries and organisations such as Grand Union, Vivid Projects, The New Art Gallery Walsall, and Wolverhampton Art Gallery.
Haseebah Ali
Haseebah Ali is an artist and arts educator based in Birmingham. Her work centres around cultural themes and occasionally political circumstances. Her artistic aim is to create work that not only educates her but the audience to which it is viewed.
Having obtained a BA in illustration in 2018, Haseebah has embarked on many opportunities including having her work on billboards, exhibiting at Saatchi Gallery with WaterAid, as well as being a guest judge for BBYA in 2022.
Ali’s work is centred around storytelling and conveying that through a visual language. As a printmaker working mainly with relief print and intaglio, Ali enjoys working with communities to exchange knowledge and uplift voices.
Kanj Nicholas
Kanj Nicholas is a multi-disciplinary visual artist, illustrator, author and community arts practitioner, based in the Midlands. Her love of bold colour, texture and pattern are influenced by her Sri Lankan heritage and her training in textile design in Australia.
Kanj is an established visual artist, creating art inspired by the natural world and the landscape she inhabits. Her repertoire encompasses water colour, acrylic, oil painting and felted textile art. Within her compositions, she explores interactions between communities and stories.
With years of experience as an Arts Practitioner, she delivers diverse, creative workshops to children and adults, working with community groups and organisations.
She recently received Arts Council funding to illustrate and write her own children’s book, ‘Imagine If We Could Fly.’ It is a colourful and artistic story book that encourages curiosity and creativity in young minds. Kanj believes that we should be encouragers, cheering on children to think out of the box and colour outside the lines!
Kanj has been commissioned to be part of the Classroom as Studio project, which aims to empower and mentor primary school teachers, to adopt contemporary, bold, risk-taking approaches to art and envision the classroom as a studio.
Kathleen Fabre
I am a highly conceptual multidisciplinary artist. A predominant theme of my work is the exploration of space and light and I specialise in architectural scale site-specific installations using everyday materials.
After graduating from the University of Wolverhampton in 2013 with a first class fine art degree. I began my career winning multiple awards for a series of forged metal sculptural installations, What the Water Gave me. Exhibiting at The Barber Institute of Fine Arts and a solo exhibition at the RBSA Gallery, Birmingham.
My first public sculpture, The Breakthrough, awarded as part of the 21 & proud commissions in 2013, hangs beneath a floating staircase in the School of Technology in Wolverhampton.
Since 2014, I became freelance artist educator working with numerous art galleries and organisations around the Midlands devising and delivering artist workshops and community and collaborative art based projects.
In 2021 I was awarded one of the flagship public art commissions as part of the British Art Show 9 Off site 9 project; my concept, ’Alignment,’ saw a series of site-specific architectural scale wool rainbow installations representing vast symbols of hope and diversity, around Wolverhampton city centre.
Mark Riley
Mark is a Community Artist, and since graduating with a BA (Hons) in Visual Arts & Art History in 1993 has worked in a variety of settings with diverse participants and partners, including schools, children’s centres, schools, and within the community.
He delivers training for public and voluntary sector organisations and holds C&G 7307 Stage 1, and Arts Award Assessor (Discovery & Explore), and Level 3 Forest School Leader.
His work revolves around helping people think, make sense of where they are and provide an opportunity to express this. This has increasingly involved exploring creativity and thinking through making. In the educational context this has investigated teaching for thinking, using child led open ended activities to encourage creative and critical thinking, and visualising ideas.
Our Funder
Paul Hamlyn Foundation was established by Paul Hamlyn in 1987. Upon his death in 2001, he left most of his estate to the Foundation, creating one of the largest independent grant-making foundations in the UK.
Their mission is to help people realise their potential and enjoy fulfilling and creative lives.
They have a particular interest in supporting young people and a strong belief in the importance of the arts.
Rob Elkington, Director Arts Connect said:
“We are thrilled to be part of the Teacher Development Fund and hugely grateful to Paul Hamlyn Foundation for their support and confidence in our partnership.
This grant gives us a unique opportunity to work over two school years with the teaching staff and leadership of our schools to test out and embed innovative approaches to art teaching for children from 5 – 11 years old. Our focus is solely on the teachers’ skills, confidence and learning and they will be brilliantly supported and inspired by their partner artists, gallery staff and the work of practicing artists. Our long-term aim as a partnership is to influence the experience of art for children in schools, way beyond the core group, inspired by the work that this pioneering group of teachers are already starting.”
