Tate Exchange Project
From 27th to 30th March 2017, teachers from A New Direction's SEN School network lead an assortment of visual arts, music, soundscape and drama activities with their students at Tate Modern. 4TU took part in the project, working with other SEN schools to raise the profile and visibility of London SEN Schools and celebrate the creative work of their teachers and students. The theme of the week was EXCHANGE.
Our first EXCHANGE was with Tate Modern. We were inspired by the artwork of Louise Bourgeous. We made a monster for our play of ‘The Odyssey’ by looking at her sculpture ‘Spider’ for the body. We used her sculpture of ‘Cell XIV’ to make the face of our monster. When we visited the gallery we showed members of the public our sculpture and were able to look at ‘Spider’ and ‘Cell XIV’ in the gallery.
Our second EXCHANGE was with other schools. We went to a music workshop led by the Vale Special School. Later on we led a drama workshop which other schools came to. We showed other schools our drama games and told them the story of our class play ‘The Odyssey’.
Our final EXCHANGE was with the general public. We told them about being autistic and made them a visual timetable that they could fill in.
At lunchtime the pupils enjoyed looking at the installation ‘Anywhen’ by Phillipe Pareno and playing in the immersive fog installation by Fujiko Nakaya.