YOUNG ARTS
With the Young Arts Task Force
The prime purpose of our Young Arts Task Force is to help young people discover and appreciate the arts.
For the past 23 years, the Society has sponsored many school projects with Artists in Residence and Art Therapists for children with special needs. Innovation has been the key with notable initiatives ranging from hugely successful “Life-Drawing days” to “Art Therapy” with several projects directed at disadvantaged young people.
A budget of £1,000 is allocated from the “Gift Aid” rebate which the Society receives each year. Our budget can be increased by applying for a grant from The Arts Society for larger projects. This enables us, through sponsoring art workshops, to support other charities looking after young carers or children who have been traumatised in various ways.. A “Young Art Task Force”, led by Angela Stein, recommends the allocation of funds each year.
In 2023 we began sponsoring a third opera singer, Ryan Vaughan Davies, who has since joined The Royal Opera House. He has also sung at our Gala Dinners.
We also sponsored Arts for Life to enable them to hold an art exhibition at Holy Trinity Church, Northwood. The Arts for Life Project aims to make impactful change to the everyday lives of vulnerable young people, who find life challenging, have a love of the arts and are able to interact in a group setting. Their projects are best-suited for children from year 3 (age 8) up to young people aged 25.
In 2023 we also began sponsoring an arts award through Koestler Arts, to encourage young offenders within the criminal justice system to change their lives through participating in the arts.
If you would like to support any of our Young Arts initiatiives, please speak to Angela Stein, Chairman, Young Art Task Force, at one of our morning meetings or email her at :
youngarts@moorparkdfas.com
supports “Young Art” with:
-
£1,000 a year (on average)
-
Local schools supported
-
Highly innovative projects
-
Huge welcome from schools
-
Primary and Secondary
-
Awards, prizes and certificates
Charity Exhibition on 14 October 2023, organised by Arts for Life. We sponsored it by donating to Holy Trinity Church, Northwood, so that Arts for Life could use the Church Hall.
Amazing results and they deserve every penny.
For the past two years our Young Arts Programme has sponsored Ryan Vaughan Davies, an aspiring tenor from Old Colwyn. He has sung at our Gala Dinners in 2023 and 2024. We were delighted to learn that in 2023 Ryan joined The Royal Opera House as one of their young Artists for the next two years.
Previously Welsh tenor Ryan Vaughan Davies was a student of the Royal Academy of Music’s Opera School where he was a Bicentenary Scholar, and also generously supported by The Norman Ayrton award, The John Clemence Trust, The Arts Society Moor Park, The Ryan Davies Memorial fund and The Bryn Terfel Foundation. He previously received his Masters of Music degree from the Royal College of Music and Bachelor of Music from the Royal Northern College of Music.
Operatic highlights of recent seasons include Peppe Pagliacci for Iford Arts, Prunier La Rondine for IfOpera, Rinuccio Gianni Schicchi, Torquemada L'heure Espagnole, Der Tenor Ariadne auf Naxos, Interrogator WITCH and Tom Rakewell The Rake’s Progress, all for Royal Academy Opera. He has also previously appeared with the Garsington Opera Festival, the Grange Festival, Longborough Opera Festival and Buxton Opera Festival.
In concert, Ryan recently made a number of acclaimed debuts including at the BBC Proms as the Lover Il tabarro with the Hallé and Sir Mark Elder, and with the Ulster Orchestra in performances of Messiah with conductor Nicholas Chalmers. He has previously made appearances at the Southbank Centre, Grieghallen Bergen, and in the US with the North American Festival of Wales.
Through a donation to our Name an Award programme, the Arts Society Moor Park has supported our core activity in 2023, making sure that we can deliver the benefits of the Koestler Awards to even more people this year. The Arts Society Moor Park has also created a named award for a young person currently using art to turn their life around after coming into contact with the criminal justice system.
Art Exhibition at Colnbrook School Thursday 26 May 2022, sponsored by Young Arts, The Arts Society Moor Park
Click here to read whole article
GREAT SCHOOL PROJECTS and PRIZES GALORE!
The Arts Society Moor Park sponsorship has been exceptionally successful in recent times.
Here are some of the highlights :
Colnbrook School, South Oxhey
WALL TILES CREATED BY CHILDREN WITH SEVERE AUTISM
Two of the finished 2020 projects - both from Colnbrook School.
With the help of an Art Therapist sponsored for two days by the Society the children produced a wide range of designs. These were converted into wall tiles. The tiles have now been fitted to the outside wall of the school and look great.
Other designs were used to create a wall banner (above) and animal paintings (right), all of which now hang proudly within the school.
Milly Forrest, soprano
catapulted from concert hall cloakroom to the main stage when star fell ill
For the past two years our Young Arts Programme has sponsored Milly Forrest, an aspiring opera singer from Bedford Park. If lockdown had not got in the way she would have been singing at some of our events in 2020.
In one of her early public appearances she sang The Lonely Goatherd from The Sound of Music. Milly showed remarkable talent and confidence for one so young.
She also recalls starring in a local production of The Wizard of Oz and says it is fun, though a little embarrassing to see herself as an eight-year old.
Milly started studying music at the age of ten at the Royal College of Music.
Her ambition has always been to become a professional opera singer.
Her big break came in 2017 at the Wigmore Hall. She found herself in the limelight, catapulted from part-time work in the concert hall cloakroom to the main stage when soprano Ruby Hughes fell ill with tonsillitis and was forced to pull out of performing in the end of season concert. Milly was asked to step in and her solo performance was hailed as a triumph.
The Guardian reviewer Tim Astley, wrote :"Milly Forrest, with her silvery tone, sounded exquisite in Purcell’s If Music Be the Food of Love."
Thereafter she continued her MA studies at the RCM, partly funded by the generosity of a Chiswick resident.
In spring 2020 Milly was understudying in the ENO’s production of Le Nozze di Figaro and was due to work as a Garsington Opera young artist in the summer (but lockdown intervened!).
Fortunately, while open air concerts were still possible Milly performed in and co-hosted the Chiswick Festival 2020.
Bishop Ramsey School, Ruislip
THE FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY SUNDIAL FROM BISHOP RAMSEY SCHOOL
To commemorate The Arts Society Moor Park's 50th anniversary, our Young Arts chairman, Angela Stein, commissioned a sundial in 2017. It was designed and created by students of Bishop Ramsey School in Ruislip. The finished sundial was presented to Moor Park on 18 October 2018 and is installed below the flagpole in front of the Mansion.
Angela Stein, chairman of The Arts Society Moor Park Young Arts Group, with students and staff from Bishop Ramsey School.
Northwood School and Eastbury Farm School
Mounted art works and a collage sponsored by The Arts Society Moor Park
St Joan of Arc, Rickmansworth
CONGRATULATIONS TO TWO STUDENTS FROM ST. JOAN OF ARC
Daniel Morgan, from St. Joan of Arc School, being presented with book tokens by current Chairman, Angela Stein, for winning the National Chairman's competition. Two of his fellow students won second and third prize and all three received a certificate.
Eduarda Craveiro from Joan of Arc School, being presented with our YA trophy and an Art book.
Grangewood School
A special project called “Expressive Art Week” involving disadvantaged children who showed remarkable creativity.
Artist in Residence working with the whole school on a colourful frieze for the school dining room based on “A Midsummer Night’s Dream”
Eastbury Farm Primary School
23 years of ambitious YOUNG ART initiatives !
Many projects undertaken with Hertfordshire and Middlesex schools. Many awards and prizes organised by the Society’s Young Art Task Force. Inspiring disadvantaged children through art at the RNIB Sunshine House and Grangewood School were special moments, as were memorable Art Therapy days.
Hello Teachers and past students !
If you would like your school to be considered for The Arts Society Moor Park Sponsorship contact Angela Stein, Chairman, Young Art Task Force by email at: