Absolutely love how you can share an image and then suddenly an entire story unfolds off the back of it , one with the most artistic and community based vision that any of us could use and build upon. In this case I shared the picture of Mud Maid and then along came Ezmond the dinosaur sculpture who lives in the ground and guards the school orchard at Upper Plenty PrimarySchool. And whats more Ezmond came about as a result of support from an orgnisation that has helped communities rebuild after the Victorian bushfires. Have a read of art teacher Andrea Lewis story behind Ezmond and how with help from lots of different elements of the community, this dragon is now a a leading educational light in the school. Cant wait to meet Ezmond and walk the orchard sometime soon... Andrea Lewis Hi Costa! (and thanks Dearna for sharing this here!) I am the art teacher at Upper plenty P.S. (UPPS) Many years ago I took my own children to The Lost Gardens of Heligan and saw the sleeping goddess and the giant. From that day, I have always wanted to create a living sculpture. (I have also been looking for ways to further integrate literacy into our art program and our amazing dragon will become a writing seed next year in the hope of creating a whole school picture story book.) We are very lucky at UPPS to have a passionate school community, always looking for new ways to engage our students in their learning. We applied for a grant through MCRAG (mcrag.net/ ) as part of the bushfire regeneration program, aimed at reconnecting our school community with their natural environment in a positive way, after the devastation of the black Saturday fires. One of our amazing staff members (who is also a parent), Daisy Sherbourne, had the dream to plant a heritage orchard for our students, so together, we worked on developing a previously unused area of our grounds to create a unique space for our students. I approached artist Rod Barnett sculptures, with the hope that he would be able to assist with the steel and cement elements and students were involved in aspects of design and construction of the mound. Consisting of 24 cubic mts of crushed rock and soil, the mound was created by our students and wider school community at school, (with many many many trips up and down the hill with buckets!!), while Rod created the steel and cement pieces in his studio on the other side of the city. Ezmonds head alone weighs approx. 250 kgs, so transit was interesting to say the least. However we now have Ezmond, our dragon, settled amongst a 43 tree heritage apple and pear orchard within our school grounds. Our trees are doing well and it is our hope to use the fruit in our future cooking programs and as healthy snack options for our students. As for Ezmond, our students see him as a confidant, a friend, and a protector of our school. MCRAG Through resources and advocacy we aim to provide support and assistance to improve the Mitchell... MCRAG.NET
Posted on: Mon, 15 Dec 2014 21:38:27 +0000
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