Travelling Companions

Travelling Companions During February/March 2000 Bridget Crowley and Phil Mawdsley led workshops with a number of Exeter-based schools and educational units based on the two paintings of St.George and the Dragon by Tintoretto and Gustave Moreau. These took place mostly in the gallery with a few sessions taking place off-site. Taking a rare opportunity to see some world-class art 'in the flesh', those groups taking part all agreed they had not only been thrilled by the paintings but had enjoyed enormously taking part in discussions about them.

Each session was tailored to meet the particular needs of any given group. For instance, a group of young people from The West of England School for Children With Little or No Sight spent time with Bridget not only looking at the paintings but looking very closely at projected slide images and handling a small collection of relevant objects - some horse hair, a sample of silk, a tiara, a helmet, etc. This group was made up of children with, at least, partial vision so while description formed a large part of Bridget's session, the opportunity to see large scale details of the paintings was invaluable. This also allowed them the chance to be much closer to the image than was possible with the actual paintings which were hanging only a few feet away. That is, it was possible to be as close as neccessary to the projected image but, with security restrictions, only within 5 feet of the original.

Other groups taking part in these sessions included the following -

  • Teenagers from The Royal School for the Deaf
  • Art History undergraduates from Plymouth University's Exeter campus (the faculty of Art and Design)
  • Children at Wonford Hospital, Exeter attending the hospital's educational unit on Bramble Ward - this session, at the hospital, involved the use of projected images, large colour photocopies of details of the paintings and a practical workshop
  • Teenagers from Connect, an organisation working with young people excluded from mainstream education
  • Children from Millwater Community Special School, Honiton
The Travelling Companions workshops were also attended by all the Project Partners - apart from Park School - and hundreds of pupils at local mainstream schools, including Walter Daw First School, Ladysmith Middle School and St. Wilfreds Secondary, all in Exeter.

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