ROCK PAPER SCISSORS Mitchel Ceney 1 Sep 2021 – 31 Jul 2023 Back Mitchel Ceney worked with Year 6 children from Charlotte Sharman Primary over their final term of at the school. Marking an important transition into the next chapter of their lives, they reflected on their past few years to create drawings and messages to their past and future selves, to leave a mark on each other and the school site! As well as inventive drawing activities, Mitchel embraced a playful game-like approach to his sessions. Children sent drawings and notes via carrier pigeons, paper aeroplanes and performed role play with hand drawn props. Mitchel explained, ‘We used automatic and narrative drawing inspired by comic and street art, and incorporated text into images.’ Mitchel made ‘leavers t-shirts’ by hand-printing their drawings onto t-shirts, which the children hand drew and wrote onto with fabric pens to personalise the designs. They also worked together on a series of largescale murals. The six-panel artwork was made to revamp the wooden basketball structures in the playground, as a way of leaving an imprint on the school site as they departed. Mitchel Ceney works in pencil, ink and spraypaint, primarily drawing or painting on location. He is currently studying Illustration for Communication (BA) at Ravensbourne University in South East London. His drawings have recently been printed in magazines such as Pavement, the Big Issue and also featured in a graphic novel in 2020. His first exposure to art was when he saw graffiti around the Midlands in the 90s as well as film posters, album covers and music flyers being an inspiration dating back to when his mum’s record collection. He believes that being an artist is something that everyone should be able to do. Thank you to all involved: Children of Year 6, Charlotte Sharman Primary School Alex Kossykh, Teacher, Charlotte Sharman Primary School Andrew May, Headteacher, Charlotte Sharman Betsy Dadd, Learning Curator, Drawing Room Cora Sehgal Cuthbert, Workshop Assistant, Drawing Room Esme Wedderburn, Workshop Assistant, Drawing Room Genevieve Miller, Learning Coordinator, Drawing Room Lynn Newlyn, Teachers Assistant, Charlotte Sharman Primary School Mitchel Ceney, Artist Scrapbook Whilst drawing a self-portrait: ‘I’m an Islamic woman and that’s okay. Child The physical cut outs of drawn cameras and TV sets were used like props. The quality of the drawing didn’t matter, as holding the objects allowed children to suspend disbelief and immerse themselves in role play. It was nice seeing children who said they couldn’t draw, use their drawings to perform, rather than just sticking them on the wall to look at. Esme, Workshop Assistant When we did our ‘looking back’ at the end of term, lots of children mentioned that these were some of their favourite sessions! Alex Kossykh, Year 6 Teacher