There is much excitement at St Aidan’s Primary School in Ilford this week. Not only is a big Jubilee party to be held on the playground on Thursday, but the school is celebrating a significant achievement linked to the event. Its ‘Rivers of Hope’ design has been selected from many entries to be printed on a flag for The Queen’s Jubilee Pageant.
As part of the celebrations for the Queen’s Jubilee, schools were invited to take part in an arts-based learning project linking schools around the world through the study of rivers. The programme encouraged young people to think about the importance of safeguarding the future of their own natural environment. They were asked to create imaginative pieces of artwork, using art and design skills and utilising either natural or recycled materials, while thinking about their hopes and aspirations for the next 70 years.
The environmentally themed artworks created through the Rivers of Hope project are being displayed on an online gallery and 200 have been selected to be printed on silk flags and processed as part of The Queen’s Platinum Jubilee Pageant on the 5 June 2022.
“We are very proud,” says Headteacher Mrs Victoria Campling. “The aim of the project was to create a piece of digital artwork from real art children had made representing their hopes and aspirations for the future of the planet. This had to be based around rivers of the world. We had a group of more able children who had the experience of working together to design the flag.”
The children went on a school trip to Stratford to look at the Thames and were excited to see a family of swans. Their artwork was made using the kind of detritus found in rivers – plastic bottles and so on – to highlight the care we need to take of these life-giving watercourses.