Harriet draws on pupils' skills

A HIGHLY skilled local artist, whose work has been shown to hundreds of thousands of viewers on TV, has been helping primary school children discover their hidden talents.

Harriet Merry, a collage artist who was featured on the prestigious Sky Arts Portrait Artist of the Year programme, went into Weston on Trent Primary School to help children there create their own artistic versions of themselves.

Harriet, who is also a parent at Dame Catherine Harpur's School in Ticknall, was in We- ston Primary to teach children her singular method of creating portraits involving specially painted papers and a collage technique.

"I really loved what the children came up with," she said.

Harriet was featured on the Portrait Artist of the Year pro- gramme in 2022 one of around 60 to win a place on the show out of 2,000 applicants.

She was one of a group of artists creating a portrait of well- known classical soul musician Alexis Ffrench, who was so im- pressed with her collage portrait of him that he named it his favourite.

Harriet said: "It was really good fun doing the programme, and really scary! I was so nervous to do it. I didn't really know what to expect. I did a self portrait and got a call from Sky which I thought was an audition to go on the show. I had just started doing collage and I was really nervous about doing it in front of people with a time limit and on TV. But, actually, on the day I had lots of fun."

Since going on the programme, Harriet has been doing many more of her collage portraits including extensive work at Derbyshire Refugee Solidarity where she teaches English.

"I've met some of the most wonderful people ever there," said Harriet.

"I'm doing a portrait project with them and it's about 'seeing' these people. I want to show that these people are real people, not just numbers in boats: people who are strong and courageous and have children and wives and mothers and fathers like us. There's something about creating a portrait of someone that says 'I see you'."

Anyone interested in booking Harriet for a workshop can get in touch with her via her website which is

www.harrietmerry.co.uk. For more on Derby Refugee Solidarity see http://derbyshirerefugeesolidarity.org/

Harriet Merry's portrait of herself, and Bewar from Derby Refugee Solidarity; and (below) with pupils at the school.