Education for schools at Gainsborough's House

Our aim at Gainsborough's House is to provide a lively schools' education and outreach programme that will meet the individual learning needs of each group that visits us. Visits to the house can be tailored to cater for Key-stage 1 pupils to A-Level students. A visit to Gainsborough's House would be very useful for pupils studying History and Art and Design topics. However, a variety of cross-curricular themes, such as Literacy, feature regularly in our activities and tours.

School visit to Gainsborough's House: £2.00 per pupil, or free if your school is a member of Gainsborough's House (membership is £40 a year):

 

Extra Workshops and Activities (available all year)

Tailor-made activity/outreach: (price to be discussed before visit).
At Gainsborough’s House we will strive to make your visit relevant to the learning needs of your pupils. Perhaps there is a particular topic that you have been studying that could tie-in to the resources that we have here, or maybe you would like us to visit you. Please give us a call and we will try our best to arrange something for you.

Gainsborough Costumes and Literacy activity/outreach: (£15).
Pupils will examine the costumes in some of Gainsborough’s paintings and even have a go at trying some of them on. A range of follow up activities are available; a) Speaking and listening: Pupils will learn more about specific paintings and give a presentation to their peers. b) Writing KS1/2: Pupils will write a letter to Thomas Gainsborough to commission their own portraits, using a writing frame and key words. c) Writing KS2: Pupils study the mystery of the portrait of a boy and girl, writing their own story to explain why the two parts of the picture were separated.

Gainsborough Costumes and Art activity/outreach: (£25, or £15 for members).
Pupils will examine the costumes in some of Gainsborough’s paintings and even have a go at trying them on. Some of Gainsborough’s portraits will be discussed, looking at the choices behind the details seen. Using the activity as inspiration pupils will create their own self portraits, including items of clothing or objects that are important to them.

Gainsborough’s Model Landscapes: (£25, or £15 for members).
This one and a half hour practical session can be added to your visit to give pupils the opportunity to learn how Gainsborough made model landscapes, using twigs, rocks and broccoli to help him with his landscape paintings and drawings. Pupils will look at some of Gainsborough’s landscapes and talk about the features and techniques used to create them. They will then have an opportunity to make their own model landscapes and then sketch or paint them.

Costumed Figure Drawing: (£25 or £15 for members).
Gainsborough made his living by painting portraits of wealthy men and women. He sometimes made sketches of a sitter before he began to paint. This workshop gives pupils the opportunity to improve their observational drawing skills, when they will draw an adult dressed in period costume.

Printmaking Workshops: (please enquire for details and prices).
This practical workshop gives pupils the opportunity to learn printmaking skills for themselves in our professional print workshop here at Gainsborough’s House. Techniques such as monoprinting, relief printing and dry-point etching are taught by expert tutors.

Gainsborough Drawings from the Collection
(Jan - March 2010)

Gainsborough’s House holds an outstanding collection of drawings by Thomas Gainsborough including both landscape and figure studies, as well as works on paper by his contemporaries and followers.

This display of drawings, chosen mostly from the permanent collection, includes some important loans, such as Gainsborough’s ‘Study for the Harvest Wagon’. These drawings give a fascinating insight to Gainsborough’s technique and working methods and show a less formal yet highly creative side of the artist.

Exhibition Focused Activity: (£25 or £15 for members)
To accompany our current exhibition of works on paper your visit could include a tour of Gainsborough’s House with extra time spent in the exhibition gallery using the drawings to explore life in the 1700s. Pupils will discover how these works were created and practice their own skills by producing their own sketches and
drawings in a practical session.

 

For more information contact:

Emma Dearing, Education and Outreach Officer 
Tel: 01787 372 958 
Email:emma@gainsborough.org

Last updated: 17 February 2010