Pre-Schools’ News

This week, the children of St Mark’s and St Michael’s 3 Day and 5 Day Group visited the MCA, engaging in an early childhood program called ‘Marking Making/Meaning Making’. The purpose of this excursion was to support their thinking around the current unit of inquiry through opportunities to engage in appreciating creativity and artmaking. Working with Artist-Educators at the gallery, the children focused on the work of two artists in particular, Simryn Gill’s Maria’s Garden and the bark paintings from the Ramingining Collection.

Along with learning about these artists and their techniques, the children were asked to respond to these works through drawing and creating a collaborative garden on the gallery floor, using pieces of coloured felt and string. It was wonderful to see the children fill the gallery spaces and respond so thoughtfully and enthusiastically to both the space and the artworks.

An important aspect of the excursion was the opportunity for the children to work in the studio spaces of the National Centre for Creative Learning. Along with a fantastic ride up in the glass lift to the 3rd floor, the children experimented with mark-making materials and loose parts. Within the studio space is the Jackson Bella Room, an installation commissioned every year for the purpose of welcoming and encouraging young children to engage with contemporary art through the senses.

This opportunity to connect so intimately with the current commission Holding Ground by Lucy Simpson, was the highlight of the day for the children. They touched, smelled, moved, held and listened to familiar objects, such as seed pods, clam shells, coolamons and emu eggs, that had been recreated and moulded out of both natural materials, such as possum skins, and recycled materials, such as melted down televisions.

This was such a valuable experience for the children, to be out in our beautiful city, accessing and immersing themselves in the opportunities of a world class contemporary art space.

Kind regards,

Anna Herron and Melanie Fleming

(Educational Leaders at St Mark’s and St Michael’s Pre-schools)