Litter Champions

Three artists each worked with a different year group to create and set up their own school Litter Champions Club to help reduce litter in school grounds and to encourage engagement in their local communities. 

Artist Josie Brookes worked with Year 6 at Kelvin Grove Primary School and Bethan Laker worked with Years 3 and 4 at Windy Nook Primary School. They each had four workshops in the schools, working with the children to create their own Litter Champions school club, from creating artwork for a school display; club badges; a slogan and other club materials such as pledge cards. The key theme for each workshop was the 3 Rs - Reduce, Reuse, Recycle and all the materials used were recycled or recyclable, including sweet and food packaging, cardboard and re-using old artwork, magazines and postcards. 

 Artwork created in the workshops was used to design banners for displaying on school railings for families to see the children's key messages about reducing litter. 

 Artist Tommy Anderson worked with Year 8 at Heworth Grange Academy. The students used Letraset, print typography and learnt about macro-photography techniques, and worked with Tommy to create striking posters to be displayed around the school, in the community and in Gateshead Civic Centre to discourage littering. 

Keighley Wanless, Head of Visual Arts, Heworth Grange Academy said: "Our students loved having the opportunity to work with a local artist, and had great fun creating work that we could use within and outside of the school environment.   

"We were able to work on a theme that we were passionate about, something we decided was a local issue. 

The students were so excited to see the final outcomes, seeing how their work had evolved throughout into professional pieces."

Download Litter Champions posters (PDF, 2 MB)(opens new window)