An inspiring St Ives Art trip with a series of memorable workshops

June 3rd 2025

On Saturday 31st May, 18 pupils and 3 members of staff set off on a 4-day art adventure down to St Ives, to delve into the Cornwall rich art heritage and stunning coastline.

We travelled safely down to St Ives into two minibuses ready to immerse ourselves into Bernard Leach’s iconic potters’ studio and museum at The Leach Pottery. This was a fantastic opportunity to get pupils into the trip as we began with a brief history into Bernard Leach & Shoji Hamada who established the place in 1920, over 100 years ago. The Leach educational team fronted by Neil was inspirational as he took us on a magical journey engaging pupils throughout with an excellent potter’s wheel demonstration.

Back in the studio as a whole group we rolled up our sleeves to have a go at a Kurinuki ceramic workshop using local stoneware clay from St Agnes. It was great to see our pupils actively carving into a ball of clay with the focus on finding the form. Kurinuki is a traditional Japanese ceramic hand building technique where a vessel is created by carving out the interior of a solid block of clay.

After all the travel and Leach pottery workshop it was time for a delicious meal at By the Sea in the centre of town. After dinner, we headed down to the harbour beach for a brisk swim followed by a competitive twilight game of rounders at Porthgwidden beach between our two 4th Form teaching groups. This was the perfect way to finish the day off and along with a final refreshing sea dip!

Flickr album: Art Trip to St Ives | Height: auto | Theme: Default | Skin: Default Skin

On Sunday morning, we arose early for an active day traveling between the North and South coastline. We began at St Michael's Mount waiting for a boat crossing as we began our trek towards the rocky island crowned by a medieval church and castle. This the jewel in Cornwall's crown we gave ample opportunity to immerse ourselves in the history, tales, and legends.

After a well-deserved lunch on the island, we made our way over to a beautiful, sheltered valley near Penzance, known for its dramatic landscape, exotic subtropical planting, and contemporary art at Tremenheere Sculpture Gardens. We met the founder, Dr. Neil Armstrong for a captivating, guided tour as we followed the trails meandering in and out of woodlands. Neil introduced by outlining the three key principles that has shaped the project at Tremenheere including the landscape, planting and contemporary art. We began by discussing pupils project themes including Architecture, Environment, Other Worlds, Movement and Symmetry as a starting point and to make relevant links to each project theme.

There are over 52 artworks as part of the sculptural trail with the most iconic being the James Turrell’s, Skyspace, an elliptical domed ‘Skyspace’ chamber designed as a space from which to view the sky. This provided the perfect setting as Neil explained in more depth the key highlights from the collection including Lisa Wright’s dancing figures evoking an Arcadian space. There were lots of thought-provoking discussions including a connection made between architecture in relation to the idea of how we connect to a place. Intangibles in design refer to the elements that, while not physically present, significantly impact and the relationship an individual may have to a space or place. This led us to contemplate the calming nature and well-being benefits as adrenaline levels are estimated to drop by 40% moving through a woodland. It was fascinating as Neil shared his passion of plants, sculpture, and space with us.

We rounded off the Sunday with a trip back to Porthmeor beach. It was time for some surf action, so we hired wetsuits & boards and made our way to the sea. The waves were fairly consistent, small to medium waves that was perfect for our beginners and intermediate surfers. It was great to see how committed our pupils were to improve their technique as lots of pupils managed to pop-up and ride some quality waves!

With a bright start to Monday morning, we made our way to Porthmeor studios to meet Andy Harper in his iconic studio No.6, probably one of the oldest working artists’ studios in the country. It was great to have the opportunity for pupils to meet a practicing artist that has developed a career painting organic matter—leaves, seed pods, stems, bones—from varying perspectives. Pupils were able to ask questions and explore his creative practice from Harper’s mark making techniques to his subject matter moving towards making the invisible made real. Key themes in Haper’s artworks investigate the relationship between nature and the artificial alongside recent rendering of form in symmetrical patterns. Well worth checking out a recent link to an exhibition by Andy Harper, The Mandalas,

By 10am we split into two groups as we rotated between gallery tours at Tate St Ives including a retrospective exhibition about the Liliane Lijn: Arise Alive. As our pupils discovered art that sees the world in terms of light and energy.

It was great to see pupils interacting with the Kinetic installations and making recording throughout the Tate collection and there were plenty of works to connect with pupils’ individual thematic projects. Arise Alive surveys Lijn’s career from the late 1950s to today, spanning installation, sculpture, painting and moving image, and including her ongoing exploration and creation of new feminine forms.

We also factored in time to visit Barbara Hepworth Garden and Museum. We were lucky enough to have a guided tour with a local artist, Steve. Pupils learnt all about the artist, her life and the many techniques and processes that she used. As we uncovered Hepworth’s art, life, and legacy we explore key inspiration behind her work from her move towards abstraction and her initial journey from Leeds College of Art during the 1920’s to St Ives during the Second World War.

Each group rotated between activities as the pupil’s visited artist, Rachael Kantaris, at Porthmeor Print Studios in St Ives, and learnt all about mono-printing. They took inspiration from the exhibitions and their personal themes to prepare their printing plates. Rachel gave an inspired introduction into renowned artists from the St Ives School such as Patrick Heron, Peter Lanyon, Wilhelmina Barnes-Graham & Bryan Wynter. It was great to see pupils using stencils and motifs from their St Ives experience to create a series of multi layered colourful mono prints.

On Tuesday morning, the weather turned to light drizzle. However, this did not dampen our spirits as we made our way back up the A30 to The Eden Project. After a brief exploration of the Tropical and Mediterranean biomes we set ourselves up for a ‘Climate Challenge’ workshop. The aim of the workshop ran by Tom was to engage our pupils with climate issues affecting us today and to realise that the challenges we face are on our doorstep. The activity allowed pupils to explore the Eden project site in more detail as they were asked to consider how Eden was responding to a range of scenarios such as the effects of palm oil, food waste, recycling, etc. The four categories that pupils were asked to consider how the Eden project has responded included doer’s, shopper’s, learners and shouters. It was pleasing to see so many passionate discussions and our artists took on the bonus task with great enthusiasm as they were asked to interview members of the team. This led to some great discussions during the plenary session. We made our way out of the education centre by checking out the 70 tonnes granite Seed created by the sculptor Peter Randall Page. This monumental sculpture responds to patterns extracted from nature with 1,800 spiralling nodes carved into the surface.

A trip marked by predominately good weather and something for all our artist to help inspire their current personal investigations. A huge congratulations goes to Rupert for claiming the ‘Best on tour prize’. This was no easy decision as there were multiple pupils in contention. Rupert had a positive mindset throughout, and he was able to record detailed drawings and note taking throughout as he was keen to make as many connections as possible to his theme of movement. Chloe took the photography prize for her well-considered shots of natural forms. Whilst Oscar & Tilly claimed the star artists prizes for excellent contributions and astute questions. We are very fortunate to have a group of talented and engaged artists as we look forward to working towards developing pupils project with an eye on next year’s summer exhibition!

A huge thank you to all involved especially Miss Ling & Miss Carpenter for making this wonderful experience full of memorable moments and inspiration. Enjoy browsing through our photographs and short film from the trip.

George Cole - Art Teacher