Two of the country’s leading street artists have been communicating with staff and pupils from Nine Maidens Academy in Cornwall after hearing their work had inspired the pupils’ GCSE coursework.
Art and Design Technology teachers at Nine Maidens Academy, Tina and Jules, had been looking at street art and urban art with their pupils as part of their GCSE Art, Craft and Design curriculum. As part of the course, they introduced them to the work of artists Yuvi and Binty Bint.
“Two years ago, we visited a gallery in Newbury which was exhibiting work by London based street artist Yuvi and immediately saw the potential for using it to engage our pupils” said Tina. “Some of our pupils can lack self confidence in expressing themselves artistically, often feeling that the art they have been exposed to before has not been relevant to them.”
“Looking at Yuvi’s work and finding faces they knew opened a world of creativity to them which they felt they could be part of and engage in.”
Every year art work from Nine Maidens is exhibited at the St Ives Society of Artists gallery and in December 2019 Tina entered a full wall of Yuvi inspired work produced by her pupils which received enthusiastic feedback from the public.
“Yuvi kindly 'liked' the work when we sent him a picture and so I contacted him again this year to show him how their work had developed.”
Much to the delight of the teachers and their pupils, Yuvi replied to the message, this time sending them a short ‘thank you’ video message and asking for photos of their work to put on his social media channels and website.
“It was great to receive a response from Yuvi and the pupils are thrilled that their work will be featured on their website” added Jules.
“What, he actually sent US a video" said one pupil, while another added “If I could've done this sort of art in mainstream, I would've really liked it.”
Another street artist who has inspired the Nine Maiden pupils is Binty Bint, a mother and daughter professional graffiti mural artist team.
After hearing that Year 11 pupil Katie wanted to decorate her classroom ‘ bin binty’ style, the teachers posted a message to the artist on social media providing images of the early stages of the project and thanking her for inspiring young girls in art.
“We got an immediate response from the artist saying this had made her so happy and asking us to send additional pictures which we have done.”
"I can't believe she replied to us" said one pupil.
“Receiving such a positive response from the artists themselves has given a fantastic boost to the pupils at such a challenging time” said Tina.
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Notes to editors
With the highest proportion of “outstanding “ Ofsted ratings in the country for the quality of its alternative education provision, Wave currently runs six academies based in Cornwall, four academies based in Devon, and the Community and Hospital Education Service (CHES) & Torlands based across three centres in Devon and Cornwall. It is also progressing plans to open a new special free school in Somerset.
