Eleanor Webb, Graphic Design, Sixth Form Pupil

Eleanor Webb is one of our current sixth form pupils, studying on the Graphic Design A-Level course. Here she shares her experience of the course and examples of her latest designs.

Eleanor's work started at one of our local inner city museums, The Bridewell Museum. It was at this visit that Eleanor and other pupils were encouraged to gain inspiration and first hand research of branding and packaging. Her work shows the outcome of re-branding an old fashioned chocolate wrapper into a contemporary design.

'Having only joined Norwich School in September, I not only feel that I have settled into the school environment with ease, I also have become very fond of my 2D lessons. It is my first time studying graphic design, yet I feel I have fitted into the niche of the system with a lack of reserve. From the first day of joining NS I have felt included and able to have help if I need it. I was quite worried about starting graphics having never done if before, but it is definitely my favourite A Level subject! The briefs we receive are truly engaging, and innovative. We have completed 5 different topics since September, focusing on colour schemes, pattern, typography and graphical illustrations. My favourite brief so far was when we had to rebrand a product for a local, Norwich company. I don’t feel that not doing the subject before was a disadvantage, and I have already gained a lot of confidence within my work and within my group.'

- Eleanor Webb

Art & Design Summer Trip - Copenhagen, 2015

This summer pupils and staff visited the fascinating city of Copenhagen to enjoy a few days of culture and learn more about the finest in Danish design and architecture.

Miss Burt, Design Teacher reports:

'Copenhagen is understandably one of the greatest cities in the world. The Danes have a beautiful way of life; a healthy work-life balance, world-class cuisine, cutting edge design, exceptional architecture, engaging museums and elegant pedestrianised inner city streets.

In the early hours of Monday 24th August 2015, 31 students and 4 staff set off to experience the city first hand. On arrival, we swept through the impeccably designed Kastrup airport and headed to our inner city hotel. Despite living up to its name (Cabinn Hotel) complete with bunk beds, it was comfortable and well located.

Our first day was about acclimatising to the city. We walked to the popular area of Vesterbro for lunch, and then headed into the traditional district of Nyhavn for a canal tour, finally finishing our day with a delicious group meal at BioMio.

On our second day we headed out to the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art. Here we enjoyed the Gallery of Giacometti sculptures, the atmospheric Yayoi Kusama ‘Gleaming Lights of the Souls’, the beautiful sculpture park with panoramic views of the Sound and the powerful messages translated through their major summer exhibition Africa; Architecture, Culture and Identity.

On Wednesday we headed across the water to Christianshavn to the Danish Architecture Centre for a talk about the Scandinavian architectural firm ‘Sønetta’. The afternoon led us to the Street Food Market, the Opera House and finally the lights, rides and excitement of Copenhagen’s treasured amusement park ‘Tivoli’.

On Thursday, despite the rain, we made it to the Design Museum for a talk covering Danish furniture design from the early 19th century to the 60’s and 70’s. We then headed to the centre of the city via the Amelienborg palace.

On our final day we made a short trip to the National Museum to gain a few last insights into Denmark’s history and culture before making our way back home.

The trip was a fantastic success and will feed into our AS and A-Level units for 2015-16.

Many thanks go to all the students involved and my accompanying staff: Mr Cann, Miss Williams and Dr Kirby.

'My Norfolk' Photography Competition

The 'My Norfolk' house photography competition ran throughout December and January, the submissions highlighted a great variation of photographic talent from all years. The competition required pupils to submit an image, which responded to the theme 'My Norfolk'. From this selection of imagery each House Master has chosen a winner, from these 8 finalists the Headmaster has chosen an overall winner. Each house winner has been awarded a £30 amazon voucher, the two highly commended pupils have been awarded a 'make your own pinhole camera kit', the overall competition winner has been awarded with a brand new Fuji Polaroid camera.

We would like to congratulate Rory Bartram from Coke house, Ruby Beswick from Repton house, Yessica Quinton from Nelson house, Lizzy Watts from Seagrim house and Kitty Womack from Valpy house. Millie Amies from Parker house and Declan Bacic from Brooke house have received highly commended for their fantastic photographs.

The overall winner of ‘My Norfolk’ house photography competition 2014 was awarded to Coralie Absolum from School House for her atmospheric, beautifully composed black and white image of a beach-scape. Coralie's photograph has been entered into The game and country fair photography competition and has made it to the final 5 selected images, we are eagerly awaiting news on the final out come.

Coralie Absolum, School house, winning image

Declan Bacic, Brooke house, highly commended

Millie Amies, Parker house, highly commended

Rory Bartram, Coke house

Lizzy Watts, Seagrim house

Ruby Beswick, Repton house

Kitty Womack, Valpy house

Yessica Quinton, Nelson house

Semaphore Flag Workshop

A group from the lower fifth have created their own Semaphore flag designs that were inspired by medals and cigarette cards that featured in the World War One exhibition, on show at the end of last year.

The pupils were asked to look at colours and shapes and think about their connotations. Starting out by drawing designs and later translating them into fabric flags. The designs creating were visually beautiful and thought provoking.

The workshop concluded with a Cathedral Assembly where the pupils displayed their flags spelling out Norwich in Semaphore signals. The flags will soon be displayed in the school for all the pupils and staff to see.

BE INSPIRATIONAL - A workshop by illustrator Izzy Pheonix

'Be Inspirational' was one of a series of workshops ran by visiting artist Izzy Pheonix. Izzy is an Illustrator born and raised in central London. She has studied at Cambridge School of Art and is also a QEST scholar - we have been extremely lucky to have her inspiring us here at Norwich School.

Throughout the school year Izzy has been running workshops with the Lower 5 pupils in pattern and surface design. The workshop enables the pupils to think about mark making, pattern and surface within the context of Graphics. The pupils gain a chance to experiment with a variety of techniques and processes, introducing them to a more hands on approach to design.

R A W

RAW art exhibition opened last night with a successful private view. Norwich School pupils are exhibited alongside students from Norwich University of the Arts. Each artwork explores a raw process and raw material. RAW has been curated in collaboration with Norwich School lower sixth pupils. The exhibition is situated in Norwich School Crypt, open daily from 10-3 until Friday 27th February.

By Miss F Cant, Artist-in-Residence

Clark Boradwood-Smith, Long May She Wave

PLAY IS THE REAL ENGINE OF LEARNING

‘Play is the real engine of learning’, an exhibition that our Artist-In-Resident Francesca Cant curated and also exhibited in, along with 4 other artists. The exhibition was situated in the Crypt at Norwich School; it ran from 2nd-6th February and challenged the relationship between play and learning.

“ ‘Play is the real engine of learning’ brings together five artists playful practices, exploring the idea of play in its broadest sense.

Kelly Briggs has limited her play to a single colour, exploring new manifestations of ideas in which orange, her colour of choice, takes an undeniable precedence. Joseph Doubtfire’s sculptural and object-oriented play negotiates an instinctive and primitive weaving of materials. Both Briggs and Doubtfire are interested in potential and uncertainty, objects which in their abstract forms imply a panoply of ideas, and questions which invite only more questions. Francesca Cant, interested in the antithesis to the ‘Do Not Touch’ attitude towards contemporary display, explores touch, sense and the negotiation of space. Nicole Hudson’s work, commencing with objects and materials, is brought to life by people. Both Cant and Hudson’s work, through instruction, however implicit, invites play in a participatory sense. Graphic designer Sarah Blome has designed the exhibition poster and cover of this publication. “ – Francesca Cant

Emma Moolman L6

Emma Moolman is one of our talented L6 photography pupils, currently working on the unit Story Telling. Her images work in response to the film Oliver Twist, focusing on the idea of becoming invisible within your environment. This unit is set to push our students into thinking conceptually about themes that are present in all narrative contexts and requires them to respond in their own way. Emma's imagery is a great example of the unique, individual journey each pupil makes from their chosen film.

"I was inspired by the work of Amira Fritz, using flowers to demonstrate the emotions of the model and characters within the film Oliver Twist. I have desaturated the models skin to enhance the colours of the flowers, therefore making them the focus point and creating a sense of being hidden by them, much like Oliver was in his environment. I further exaggerated the flowers by altering the colour balance and then using the sponge tool to saturate key areas in the image." - Emma Moolman

Merry Christmas From Art & Design

( Our Upper Four pupils standing proudly in front of their festive lettering )

Quadrofoil - The First All Electric Hydrofoiling Personal Watercraft

“Quadrofoil is a thrilling, yet quiet and eco-friendy watercraft. It’s silent motor and zero emissions enable it to ride on lakes, rivers, seas & eco-zones where most motorboats and PWC’s are not allowed. No noise, no waves, no emissions.” -Qudrofoil.com

Each Quadrofoil comes with an electric outboard and a special steering system, so no oil goes in the environment. It flies at just 1 €/h and hardly any annual maintenance costs, making it the most efficient PWC on the water. Aerodynamic design and precision engineering allow it to slice the surface cruising at 20 knots with several times better efficiency than best PWC.

The simple touch screen display also acts as a key, displaying information about the battery power, range, speed and consumption makes flying the Quadrofoil simple.

For 15.000 € for the Q2A Electric (See left above), and 22.000€ Q2S Electric Limited Edition (see right above), you can own a PWC which not only flies, but also has killer futuristic looks and pioneers sustainable design.

For more information visit, http://quadrofoil.com/

By India Gill U6

Lamp Design By Kouichi Okamoto

This lamp was designed by Kouichi Okamoto

When the lamp is on the light shines through the stand to create a nice red colour. The designer has blended the red paint into the lampshade to complete the seemingly effortless transition into the lampshade. The color red is also quite a dramatic color, adding to the effect. The lamp is also available as a wall light.

By Theo Wilson U5

Lower Five Screen Printing Workshop

As part of lower five’s Art and Design rotation, they all get the chance to visit Stew Gallery and learn to screen print their own designs.

This screen-printing workshop acts as the final stage of their World War One propaganda project. Within this project they have been designing propaganda posters, responding to a brief and theme linking to World War One.

Working alongside Stew’s technicians the pupils transformed their digital designs to screen prints, exploring composition and the meanings of colour. The pupil’s gain a great insight into the journey a designer takes, from an idea to a finished product, in this case each pupil came away with a selection of hand printed posters.

Collagerie, Stew Gallery

Collagerie is an exhibition which ran from the 11th -17th October at Stew Gallery, Norwich, lucky for us at Norwich School Stew Gallery is just around the corner so we had the chance to experience this truly inspiring show first hand.

“Collagerie is a celebration of collage art and the individual styles of contemporary artists using traditional cut and paste techniques.”

All imagery is created through cut and paste technique with no technology involved. Almost all of the artists seem to gain inspiration from found imagery, magazines, newspapers, old flyers, posters, anything they can get there hands on. From here the artists cut and paste to create new meanings and narratives to the found images, becoming the artists own work. This traditional method of making work was really inspiring to the pupils and they even had the chance to create their own collages.

Millie Amies L6

Millie Amies is one of our extremely creative lower 6th pupils; she studies both fine art and photography. Here she shares with us her most recent photographic project, inspired by Steven Crane’s text “The Open Boat” her images are haunting yet beautiful.

“ I was inspired by Steven Crane’s The Open Boat to create these edited photographs. I took the idea of Humans vs. Nature and decided to capture four of my friends submerged in watered down milk. I used milk to make the water opaque and to give a sense of unknowing. I decided to lower the saturation of the photographs to give a dull and pale colour to the skin, making the viewer question whether the subject is dead. I also edited their hair back to its original colour to exaggerate the cold, lifeless skin. I also added a transparent white layer to the eyes to give the effect of misty, zombie-like eyes “ - Millie Amies L6

Wian Stipp M5

Wian Stipp is one of our very talented Middle 5 pupils. Wian is a very keen designer and is interested in the idea of branding. Here he shares some of his most recent work...

Applying a logo to the package

“ My work is mostly focused on branding and 2D redesigning but I occasionally do photography. I enjoy taking brands like ‘Coca-Cola’, ‘Hollister’ or even making my own (as shown above) and redesigning the logo, package and its website interface. I use illustrator to make the logo, Photoshop to apply it to the package and design the website and then I import all my work into Adobe Indesign to put it all together. Usually, I upload my designs to Behance, which is an Internet page where photographers, artists, designers and illustrators can share their work and be noticed by others. I use Behance to research and to get ideas for my projects. My Behance - https://www.behance.net/WStipp ” – Wian Stipp

Zaha Hadid

By John Savill U6

Zaha Hadid is an Iranian-born British architect.

She works on architectural pieces that are flowing and contemporary. Her work reminds me of some Scandinavian design because of the smooth lines and the white/ bleak-monotone colours. I really like the curves and patterns that are created with all of her work. I also like how the light from inside the building is emitted through small gaps in the buildings, creating subtle highlights in the building when viewed from the outside. She creates very large architectural pieces that are of a certain style and sought after. Her single-mindedness and her singular lack of compromise make all of her designs flawless and impressive. She does have many projects that never got out of the preliminary design phase (such as the Cardiff Bay Opera House) because of her un-willingness to change her designs in any way.

Timeline

1977: She worked for her former professors, Koolhaas and Zenghelis, at the Office for Metropolitan Architecture, in Rotterdam, the Netherlands; she became a partner in 1977.

2002: In 2002, she won the international design competition to design Singapore's one-north master plan.

2006: In 2006, she was honoured with a retrospective spanning her entire work at the Guggenheim Museum in New York; that year she also received an Honorary Degree from the American University of Beirut.

2007: In 2007 Zaha Hadid designed the Moon System Sofa for leading Italian furniture manufacturer B&B Italia.

The 4 Dimensional Clock

By Mark Garside U5

Each hour is represented by a triangular slice of concrete, layered in a spiral formation downwards from 12 o'clock through to 1, creating an inner receding dimension within the clock’s face. In the shape of a spiral staircase, its design aims to visualise the concept of time by its constantly changing patterns of light and shade. The hands are made of glass. This clock clearly tells the time while quietly engaging the viewer in the concepts of a 4th dimension.

Bob Catchpole, Norfolk Sculptor

By Kieran Betts U6

Bob Catchpole is a Norfolk-born sculptor who works frequently with garden tools. Some of his designs seem to turn an object such as a spade into a living plant with branches or roots, due to the organic curves of the wood. Others are more geometrical and imply topiary; the "Ziggurat I” is an intermeshed fork and spade which go through each other and form a stepped pattern. Others (such as the “toolskater”) series mimic the human form, but with limbs replaced by the metal end parts of garden implements. Still others have a mechanical feel to them, as if poised to be turned on to perform some task.

Bare Conductive

By Freddie Briscoe U6

Bare Conductive is an innovative young company based in London. As part of their final year design engineering project on their combined course at Imperial College and the Royal College of Art, they created ‘electric paint’. Their progress and research into this new concept led to large levels of public interest, and eventually led the four inventors to pursue their idea further after they graduated. After large levels of research, experimentation, and design Bare Conductive was formed.

Their innovative ‘electric paint’ has carbon powder in the paint and so when it dries it conducts. The possible uses are endless - from teaching children basic electronics to creating walls that will turn on a light at the touch, and the paint could even be used in advertising (such as posters that will play music to the touch.)

Follow the link for details of their newest project ‘the touch board’

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Y3eSrUQTesg

Smart Skin Technology for Aircraft

By Jennifer Williamson L6

Work is underway at BAE Systems to give aircraft human-like ‘skin’, enabling the detection of injury or damage and the ability to ‘feel’ the world around them.

This technology, currently being developed by the Advanced Technology Centre, would enable the aircraft to sense wind speed, temperature, physical strain and movement, to a far higher degree of accuracy than presently possible.

The health of the aircraft could thus be continually monitored, enabling potential problems to be detected and reported back on before they became a danger. On-ground check-ups would become more infrequent, and aircraft maintenance would become more efficient. This would improve not only the safety but also the availability of the aircraft.

The ‘smart skin’ would consist of tens of thousands of micro sensors or ‘motes’; at less than 1mm squared, these motes are complete computing packages containing sensors, processing, communication ability and power. In just the same way that receptors on the skin transmit information from environmental stimuli to the brain, these sensors, when used in conjunction with the appropriate software, would be able to communicate vital information concerning the aircraft. Another advantage of using such small sensors is that it opens us the possibility of retrofitting them to existing aircraft, or even spraying them onto aircraft as is done with paint.

Senior Research Scientist Lydia Hyde, who is leading the research and development and whose idea came to her when she observed her tumble dryer preventing itself from overheating via a sensor, explains her aspirations for the technology: “By combining the outputs of thousands of sensors with big data analysis, the technology has the potential to be a game-changer for the UK industry. In the future we could see more robust defence platforms that are capable of more complex missions whilst reducing the need for routine maintenance checks. There are also wider civilian applications for the concept which we are exploring.”

The research forms part of a range of new systems being investigated under a major programme exploring next-generation technology for air platforms.