• Galloper offshore wind farm commissions Harwich and Dovercourt High School students to produce contemporary artwork
• Students guided by celebrated London designer
• Final piece will take centre stage at Harwich Festival and hang at Galloper’s Operations and Maintenance Base.

Talented artists and graphic designers at an Essex school are creating an original “legacy” piece of art working with a top designer in a project commissioned by offshore wind farm Galloper.

The final work by the 15-strong team of 13 and 14-year-olds at Harwich and Dovercourt High School will hang in the reception at Galloper’s operations and maintenance base at Harwich for its 25-year life span.

In weekly after-school sessions with illustrator and graphic designer David Meldrum, managing director of Sherbet Creative, based in Great Bardfield, near Braintree, whose clients include Ikea and Castrol, the team will create designs that David will bring together and digitally produce one striking 6ft x 4ft piece incorporating all their work.

Galloper, a 56-turbine offshore wind farm run by RWE from the Harwich base, commissioned and funded the project as part of its ongoing work with the local community and schools.

Before it goes on display in its Harwich ‘ home’, the artwork will form part of the summer Harwich Festival at the Harwich Heritage Festival  in an exhibition that the student team will curate and promote.

Louise Craigie, Director of Art and Innovation at Harwich and Dovercourt High School, said the idea was for the team to follow a professional brief to produce a collaborative piece.

“Galloper has given the students the opportunity to work just as they would if they were freelance or working in a small agency. This is a genuine life-skill project that will add huge weight to their post-16 applications and their CVs.

“They will have weekly sessions with a highly experienced graphic designer. They all have their own sketch books and will be involved in the whole process, learning so much from David about techniques and the software he will use to bring all their work together in one piece digitally.”

The Year 9 students will work on the project on top of their GCSE courses they have just started.

“This is a big commitment, something beyond their curriculum and it will carry some serious weight for their future,” said Louise.

To kick off the project, the team met Kieron Drew, Production Manager at Galloper, who explained the growing role of renewable energy in the UK’s energy supply, and how the turbines spin to generate clean green energy. Students also watched a video of the base foyer where their work will be hung.

They had the chance to feel what it was like to be out at sea on a Galloper turbine by the virtual reality headset with a 360-degree experience.

David, who has a first-class honours degree from Camberwell School of Art, has worked as both as a graphic designer and educator for more than 25 years and has been awarded a prestigious D and AD gold award.

He gained international publicity for his food illustrator design work.

He said: ‘it’s fantastic to have been selected to work with the pupils at the school. We have already had a number of workshops and they are a wonderful and enthusiastic dream team to be creating art and design with.

‘The pupils have embraced the creative techniques I’ve introduced to them, some of which were very new, with an open and committed approach. I’m looking forward to seeing their work both displayed at the Harwich Festival and the large-scale piece at the operations base. It will be a credit to them and the art team at the school.’

Sean Chenery, General Manager for Galloper said: “This project is a great opportunity for us to get involved with the local community and to introduce renewable energy to students in a different way.

“Essentially these students are getting to use their real-life skills to learn about our industry, and we are in the privileged position of being able to see the results.

“Renewable energy and art may not necessarily seem like they go hand in hand, but renewable energy art and sculpture work is becoming an interesting concept. Artistic structures have been designed across the world to harvest green energy and to educate and inspire individuals.”