Toolstack 2011

Toolstack - 2011

Having worked with Adrian the previous year on the development of five sculptures for the neighbouring park, the Head of Wellstead Primary School had no hesitation inviting him back when funding became available for another public artwork project. This time the school had the exciting opportunity to create a sculpture within the grounds of the school itself.

The school was built on ancient farmland and the children had already studied the history of the area as far back as Roman times. The challenge for Adrian was to come up with a relevant but new take on the subject. Drawing from his own interests and family history, he started researching the numerous types of hand-tools that had been used to tend the land and livestock there over the past 2000 years. This idea went down very well with the teachers and a programme of workshops was scheduled into the school timetable.

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A large bright room was set up in the school as an artist’s studio and over the space of a single week, Adrian worked with every single class (over 200 children). He displayed dozens of photographs of ancient farm tools, but what really captured the children’s imaginations was the collection of real tools Adrian had brought with him. His grandfather was a master-craftsman who lived and worked next to a farm in the Derbyshire countryside, and Adrian had saved a number of his tools, so this was the ideal opportunity to inspire another generation with all these fascinating objects.

Over the course of the week Adrian encouraged the children to experiment with all-sorts of recycled materials to make dozens of life-size sculptures and collages of the farm tools. He then assembled several of these into a maquette design proposal that was shown to all of the children and teachers for approval. The end result was a 3 metre high welded steel sculpture called ‘Toolstack’ that was installed in the central courtyard of the school, visible to most of the classrooms.