Monkey: Journey to the West

Students at the O2 before the workshop

Make-up and prosthetics demostration

Year 12 BTEC Art and Design and Year 10 Music students benefitted from a fantastic trip to the O2 to see groundbreaking new opera Monkey: Journey to the West. They also took part in a workshop designed to give them an insight into interdisciplinary practice within the visual and creative arts.

Monkey: Journey to the West brings opera right into the 21st century with the combination of music, martial arts, stunning costume and make-up design and fabulous animation, choreographed to fit with live action, created by Jamie Hewlett, the mastermind behind animated musicians Gorillaz.

During the workshop students were allowed backstage to see the show’s actors being made up. They also got to take part in a singing workshop, where the instructor had them rapping in Mandarin in under fifteen minutes. Following the workshop students viewed a matinee performance of the opera.

Here are a few of the student’s observations about the things they saw and learnt;

It was amazing to see the prosthetics being stuck on. They are attached with glue that stays tacky; the amount of glue used depends on the amount the person sweats. It takes 30 minutes for the make-up artist to apply the make-up; prosthetics take longer, sometimes over an hour. Every character in the show has their own make-up artist. The prosthetics are made in the same way a dentist would make a mould of your mouth. Often the face is airbrushed to make the prosthetics look more real.

Sarah Moss, Year 12


The way the costumes moved with the performers was great. I especially liked the costumes of the gymnasts, especially the shrimp. It wasn’t complicated and allowed the actress to move but I really liked the legs that were attached to her back.

Hazel Whiles, Year 12

Art in Bromley; an environmental sculpture project.

As part of the Art & Design work related learning initiative, BTEC Art students were invited to create proposals for environmental sculptures in and around the Bromley area. The brief was set by Bromley Borough Council and was open to local artists and art students. The brief involved the use of recycled or natural materials to create sculptures promoting environmental issues.

TRS students created a range of ideas including, ‘THINK’ by Philippa Williams Y12, pictured below.

Year 11 Trip to Kew Gardens

Year 11 students after scaling the tree-top walkway

On the 5th of November Year 11 students studying BTEC and G.C.S.E Art and Design visited Kew Gardens to collect visual resources for their project work around the theme of Barriers.

The day was a great success and a lot of excellent work was produced. As part of the trip we visited the Palm House and the Princess of Wales Conservatory. They were also given the opportunity to test their head for heights when scaling the new Xstrata tree top walkway.

The students conducted themselves really well and were a credit to the whole school.

Year 12 Students Visit Ravensbourne College of Art and Design

Students involved in a critique of their life-drawing.


Students receiving advice on interview skills

On the 24th of October AS and Year 12 BTEC students visited Ravensbourne College of Art to talk with student ambassadors, learn about preparing their art college portfolio, find out how to be a successful interviewee and take a course of life drawing. The students were really actively involved in the day and their Life Drawing was praised by Foundation Course tutors at the college.

'The day at Ravensbourne College of Art and Design was very informative because we learnt how to put together a professional looking portfolio. The advice was good and the talk about interviews was really useful'

Bethany Rooks

Year 12

BTEC Trip to East London Printmakers

A student working on an etching plate with Nick from East London Printmakers

On October 17th , Year 13 BTEC had a daytrip to Hackney to visit an art studio called East London Printmaker’s. Miss Underhill introduced us to Nick Morley who works as studio coordinator, he also works independently as a printer and produces his own work in different printing techniques including etching, lino-cut printing and screen printing.

Nick gave us a tour of the working areas and explained health and safety in the studio and how to use the machinery correctly. Miss Underhill explained etching and how absorbing it can be. Nick then gave an etching demonstration with one of his etching plates. He explained to us how to prepare the plate and how acid must be applied for the engravings to become useable at the printing stage, he spread thick printing ink over each area and buffed the plate in circular motions to make sure the ink stayed in the grooves. After this process Nick showed us the printing process which resulted in the plate being manually wheeled through a press which printed and embossed the paper.

Throughout the tour of East London Printmaker’s Nick answered questions that we had for him about himself and the Printers studio, we found out about him not being interested in printing until he studied for a Foundation Degree at university which shaped his future interests. We also found out about ho much he sells his prints for and why. He gave us an insight to editions, he told us that an edition print must only be printed at the agreed amount of the artist, for example 10 prints, and only 10 prints must me made and sold. After making the print, the screen or plate must be destroyed as no other copies of the prints can be made for copyright and legal rights. We asked him how many prints he usually does in his editions and he explained that he usually makes 20-35 prints in one edition and only ever sells them for less than £50, this is because he believes that if someone who will buy a print which is cheaper than £50 because a handmade print requires craftsmanship, which is more valuable than the mass produced prints which are sold in nation wide stores.


Overall the trip to ELP really gave the Year 13 BTEC group a detailed insight to printing in general and basic information on selling or buying prints. We had a good day and got to learn lots of things which supported our BTEC unit in Surface Pattern. It allowed us to expand our knowledge beyond the facilities available at school.
East London Printmakers hold regular open galleries where prints are for sale and also has open days and memberships for artists who want to learn to print or continue printing for freelancing or personal leisure.

By Charlie Watts

Year 13