Art House
Art House is a set of films, teaching notes and a competition designed to engage primary school students with the unique art collection in Parliament.
The teaching resource
The Art House teachers' pack is a standalone resource to help you explore different parliamentary artworks in the classroom. You can also use it to help your students prepare work for entry into the Art House competition. The competition will launch in September 2012 and will run throughout the autumn term.
The pack contains three sets of teaching notes accompanying a series of short films. They show Members of the House of Lords talking about their favourite works of art. The chosen pieces follow three themes:
Using the resource
Start your session by playing one of the four short films available online which look at art works from three jumping off points: stories, events and people. Each film has supporting notes to help your class move through three steps:
Get started: find out about the art works
After watching the short introductory film about the artwork, use the accompanying notes to hold effective class discussions about each work.
Get investigating: look in detail at the artwork
This section of the resource provides tips and ideas for undertaking further research and running activities about each of the artworks, the artist that created them, and the techniques used.
Get creative: make your own works of art and share them
Use these hands-on classroom activities and inspire your class to get creative. From collage to painting, the activities are achievable in the classroom and will produce results that you can display in school or enter into the Art House competition.
*Image detail from ‘Baroness Amos’ oil on canvas by Paul Benney © Palace of Westminster Collection, WOA 6386
The competition
The competition is now closed.
Every student that enters will receive an Art House certificate of recognition from Parliament along with a certificate for the school as a whole.
Three winners and six runners-up will have their work displayed on the Parliamentary Estate at a special exhibition. They will be invited to attend the launch of the exhibition, where they will also take a tour of Parliament.