The Town Council have this year worked with 20 Art and Design students from BMet Sutton Coldfield College on their industrial placement programme.
The industrial placement programme is an opportunity for young people to gain valuable work experience.
The mayor tasked students to design a sculpture or art piece for a public place within Royal Sutton Coldfield, with the theme “British Animals’’, land, air, sea and flora British species in mind. The design also had to have environmental and sustainability considerations.
Over the course of the programme, the mayor has visited the students 3 times: to launch the project, view progress and assess their final designs, with verbal and written feedback given to each student.
Final designs were presented to the mayor in a visit to the college on Tuesday last week. Students understood and embraced the brief well and the mayor was impressed with the quality and variety of designs.
Student Lily Bailey said:
“I really enjoyed exploring the theme of our industrial placement project and found it useful that we were given creative freedom to design something true to our own artistic vision.
The feedback we received from our client I found to be supportive when it came to the experimental/ production process of my public art piece and designing my final outcome”.
Student Marian Youssfi said:
“It has made me connect more with animals and the natural environment. I want to express, through my work, that they can feel the same as I can and bring positive feelings. It has been a great experience, I was able to enjoy working on a great project that has given me the opportunity to make a canvas and give a positive contribution to the community.
I pray a lot for other people to make similar projects since there are many different ideas, and that can be a starting point for a new artist who could go further.”
A winner will be selected in the coming weeks.