Artistic children have celebrated Wallsend’s shipbuilding heritage.
Year three pupils from Carville Primary School have been working with the Laing Art Gallery to create models inspired by the town’s former shipyards.
Their work was based on the ‘Last Ships’ exhibition by photographer Chris Killip, currently on display at the gallery.
The exhibition documents the huge ships and industrial cranes, which once provided the backdrop to everyday life along the River Tyne.
Pupils paid a visit to the exhibition at the Laing before producing a huge collage based on the photographs.
Back in school, with help from gallery staff, the classmates explored more pictures of the Wallsend shipyards and skyline and made model ships and cranes.
Allan Qualters, year three teacher, said: “We are very close to the site of the former Swan Hunter shipyard here and the cranes on the riverside are visible from the school.
“The children are fascinated by the cranes so it has been fantastic to develop their understanding of our community’s heritage and identity and explore the huge impact the shipbuilding industry, and its decline, has had.
“They have really enjoyed taking part in the project and have shown such curiosity and worked very well in teams. They display much more animation and excitement when talking about their surroundings and can now recognise various features of the local area from their work.”
Emma Beveridge, from the Laing Art Gallery, visited the pupils during a special assembly where she presented them with a heritage award from Historic England for their efforts.
She said: “The children have done fantastically well – they came to visit the gallery and thought about what heritage means to them and researched how they could find out about their heritage and family history.
“We also researched the last ships and they created two pieces of artwork and 3D models of ships and cranes of Wallsend.
“It was a pleasure to be invited along to their celebration assembly and present them with a plaque which recognises Carville as a heritage school.”
