Dounby school sculpture on show at Scottish National Gallery in Edinburgh

Seeing the world through the eyes of the children at Dounby Primary School has led to the creation of a unique and insightful art sculpture which will go on show at the Scottish National Gallery in Edinburgh soon.

As part of the Creative Learning Network and the National Galleries of Scotland project Your Art World, children and young people from 3-18 have been challenged to make and share their art.

Dounby Primary is one of only four schools to be tasked with creating a whole-school art installation – and they have gone one step further!

The children chose the word ‘protect’ to work as their catalyst and as a result, their main piece of artwork “Trashy” was formed as a large 3D figure made of trash who both needs protecting and can protect. Trashy will be surrounded by a protective wall – made up from around 140 “protection” boxes, one made by every child in the school.

Within Trashy’s hands will be another special creation made by the children – a character known as Bob.

Their exciting journey from Orkney to Edinburgh started on 21 February – thanks to McAdie and Reeve and Pentland Ferries. But their arrival on the Scottish mainland will see them take a very different route to the National Gallery.

Dounby Primary School Head Teacher, Islean Gibson, explained: “We have a pupil leadership group who have made sure every pupil (Nursery to P7) has contributed to the sculpture – in fact each child has filled their very own box of items to protect. Protect is the word the group chose to build their installation around as they want to protect Orkney and its wildlife, the world and everyone in it.

“The pupils in our art group have created a video to show the staff in the gallery in Edinburgh how to put their creation together as we are unable to go ourselves unfortunately.

“The children have embraced the project and came up with the idea of a travelling companion in Bob who could go on his own peedie adventure. Bob will be getting up to all sorts as he navigates his way to the capital taking pictures of his exploits along the way before ending up back in the protective hands of Trashy.

“The artwork has been successfully delivered but not yet installed. However, Bob is at Millburn Academy today (2 March) and tomorrow before heading to Skye on Monday! Part one of his Highland Tour is underway. We hope his adventures will be captured on film which will feature in a book the school hope to create at the end of the project.”

Read more about the project here: (https://www.nationalgalleries.org/learn/your-art-world).