Trail Art Part I: Medieval Michaelston

Following on from our day of creative activity at Caerau last summer, pupils from Michaelston Community College (MCC) and Glyn Derw High (GD) created a series of ephemeral artworks for our Medieval Michaelston and Romans to the Races Trails. Both workshops were devised and led by Caer Heritage Project lead artist Paul Evans and were based on the work of Andy Goldsworthy and street artists Slinkachu, Ronzo and Mark Jenkins. The challenge behind the workshops was to create transitory works of art that reflected something of the heritage of the trail – but with a twist of wit …

Stage one of the workshop with pupils from MCC was to make sketches of motifs and shapes from the medieval church at Michaelston.

We decided that the door of the church would make an excellent ‘portal’ into the past – so we began to make one using interwoven twigs and branches. Care was taken to keep the design symmetrical and to incorporate the three interlocking circles from the apex …

During the next stage of the workshop the young people made individual ephemeral artworks using modelling clay – again from the preliminary sketches based on Medieval motifs.