Representing 275 Years of Kingswood in Art Form

July 14th 2023

To mark the 275 year celebration of Kingswood founding we set the challenge for our Junior Art Scholars to respond to; how would you visually represent 275 years of Kingswood? A selection of Scholars’ responses are displayed beautifully in the Headmaster’s Corridor, demonstrating a variety of interpretations, though many have chosen the common theme of John Wesley’s portrait. “I am assured Wesley would have loved the opportunity to celebrate his image in these multifarious forms!” Says Sophie Elliott, Art Teacher at Kingswood School.

Below is some artwork from our Scholars and sharing what Kingswood means to them.

Noah (Year 7)

John Wesley Now & Then

“To celebrate the 275th anniversary of Kingswood School, I wanted to create a piece of art that combined the rich diversity of modern culture with the history of the school's founder, John Wesley. I thought the best way to do this was to collage a traditional portrait of John Wesley using bright colours and images relating to modern life. This process was very time consuming as I built the portrait up, section by section, paying attention to high and low lights, specific features and shapes to recreate a recognisable image of John Wesley.”

Amelie (Year 8)

“My piece celebrates Kingswood’s diversity, by capturing the beautiful features of my friends. All three eyes in the piece are those of students in my year who are of different ethnicities and cultures, who all go to Kingswood school. I chose to do this piece because I was fascinated by the history of the school and how it used to be an all-boys institution. This inspired me to reflect on the students at Kingswood today and how they are from much more diverse backgrounds and genders. I think this therefore celebrates Kingswood school well for its 275^th anniversary, and how it has changed but kept its values all the way from John Wesley’s time. I originally was going to do one single eye, but I decided to include two more because I thought that it added more depth and interest, developing further my idea of how inclusive the Kingswood community is for all. This piece was done in pencil, with some areas of watercolour on top in the infamous Kingswood colours. I chose to use this medium of drawing because it is one which really interests me and I thought it was the best choice to capture the images, as it is quite forgiving and simpler which makes it easier to look at.”

Maria (Year 10)

“In my picture, I wanted to combine two times - the past and the present. I showed the school now, the school when it was just built, as well as the creator of the school - John Wesley. My picture is made in one colour, which shows that no matter how much time has passed, the school is only improving and continues to educate young people. I chose to paint with watercolours, because it is this material that gives the picture a light look and allowed me to capture details well.”

Adam (Year 10)

“I chose this image to represent Kingswood because my research found that in a lot of Wesley’s portraits he was holding a bible. At first I thought it would be hard to recreate the writing on the outside of the bible, however I managed to overcome this by indenting the paper in the shape of the writing so when I put charcoal over the top it wouldn’t go into the gaps thus leaving the lettering white like in the photograph I took. I used charcoal because I really like the contrast it gives as well as the texture; I prefer it over pencil as it gives a matt finish helping it look more realistic.”

Luca (Year 7)

“I decided to create an A1 pointillism drawing of John Wesley, the founder of methodism and Kingswood School. John Wesley changed many lives with this school, so, on reflection, I think that each dot could represent a life changed by the school. Time was a huge problem with this piece as each dot took time due to precision. It has taken 7 months of trials, learning and then committing to a large scale. I used fineliner pens for this piece as they can create small intricate details but really stand out from the page much more than pencil.”