Hello, my name is Bianca, I’m a field archaeologist for Wessex Archaeology and wanted to share with you the exciting workshops I carried out with my fellow colleague and archaeologist, Talia and artist Kerry Lemon at Greentrees Junior School this week.
Kerry (http://www.kerrylemon.co.uk/) is an artist who has been commissioned by Barratt Homes to create permanent artworks for the new development Riverdown Park and the adjoining Country Park, which will be based on the beautiful artwork made by the children of Greentrees School. As part of this exciting project, the Greentrees pupils designed silhouette images that will be made into lanterns, which were based on workshops provided by Wildlife Drawing, Same Sky and our Wessex Archaeology workshop.
We based our sessions on the types of archaeological finds found during our excavation at the School before it was built and showed them exciting artefacts, which was enjoyed by all. Inspiration for their lanterns came from spectacularly large finds such as the horns and skull of an aurochs (a type of wild cattle, now extinct).
The Greentrees students loved handling the objects we brought with us and trying to figure out how animal bones and skins would have been used in the past.
Wessex Archaeology also has a department dedicated to uncovering the environments of the past. We brought along the tiny snails we find in the ancient chalk landscape, which helped archaeologists to understand how their School’s landscape looked 5000 years ago.
The beautiful images created by the students of Greentrees Primary School were a delight to behold.
The lanterns were paraded on Tuesday 20 March 2018 at Sycamore Drive, Bishopdown Farm