By Mrs Lugsden (Head of Art and Textiles)

On Tuesday, our Year 11 and Upper Sixth Form Art students explored modern and contemporary art from around the world at the Tate Modern in London.

The Tate Modern houses over a hundred years of art, from early 20th-century modernism to exciting works created today. This includes paintings, sculptures, and more by artists from across the globe, featuring iconic works by Pablo Picasso and Andy Warhol.

The trip was an excellent opportunity for our art students to see artworks first-hand and appreciate their scale, medium, and texture. Students were tasked with exploring the galleries for inspiration to incorporate into their coursework projects, and with such an impressive collection to view, they were not disappointed!

From Gerhard Richter’s large-scale abstract paintings to Cildo Meireles’ tower of radios, there was plenty of variety to suit everyone’s tastes. Students will now review the research they collected and begin to develop some of the themes, ideas, and concepts they discovered during the visit.

Ella Bowis (Upper Sixth) reflected on the day: “I found the visit to the Tate Modern so insightful as I am currently developing my final major project for my A Level art. I saw many new pieces, such as works by Martin Kippenberger and Jacqueline Humphries. Both of these artists use bold lettering in their work to convey meaning and message within their pieces of art, which is something I’d like to include in my own project. I really enjoyed this trip to the Tate as I could not only see work from current artists but also be inspired by the various different ways that they could portray portraiture, which is what I’m looking at in my project. I look forward to the next trip and seeing how different the art may be the next time I visit.”