Cow crazy: Moo-ving forward with visual arts in 2021
Our very own ‘Miss Mary Moo’, a uniquely decorated cow sculpture designed for the exciting art trail ‘Cows about Cambridge’, has made its way to the Grand Arcade shopping centre this week.
The spectacular public art event will see 90 life-size cow sculptures, each designed by local artists, pop-up in various locations around Cambridge from 28th June. A further 46 Mini Moos, created by local schools, colleges and community groups, have been dotted around the City from today – one of which is ‘Miss Mary Moo’, named after our founder Mary Ward.
Starting life as a blank canvas, our Mini Moo was unveiled in a whole school assembly – taking centre stage as the curtains opened to the sounds of ‘Also sprach Zarathustra’ by Richard Strauss (better known as the 2001: A Space Odyssey soundtrack). We then held a design competition, encouraging all year groups from ages 11-18 to enter their ideas to transform this blank canvas into a beautiful design that represents our school ethos.
Once submissions had been received (anonymously), our Headmistress and a team of judges chose three winners and a series of runners-up. The chosen team of six students then developed a unified concept from the winning design, which was lovingly transferred onto the blank canvas of our Mini Moo using primarily graphite, acrylic paint, posca pens and a varnish sealant.
Year 9 Student Amelia H., who helped design and create the Mini Moo, said: “I enjoyed painting with my friends and working together to create something that represents our school ethos. I think our design clearly shows our concept and ideas. I’m looking forward to seeing it out and about in Cambridge.”
The final colourful design that is emblazoned on Miss Mary Moo includes symbols that represent the breadth of subjects our students study within our creative curriculum at St Mary’s. From art, drama and music, to the sciences, languages and computer science, Miss Mary Moo is our symbol of education and its role within our lives and our future. The bright rainbow paintwork also represents equality, knowledge, creativity and fun. Head of Visual Art at St Mary’s, Ms Conroy, said:
“It is a privilege to be a part of such a large-scale art project and satisfying to know that our students have played an integral role in the design and creation of a Mini Moo. Public art is such an important way of bringing communities together and getting people to be part of a collective experience. We were astounded by the wonderful variety of designs and the creativity of the submissions we received from the girls – and we can’t wait to see how the public reacts to Miss Mary Moo.”
Miss Mary Moo was collectively designed and created by Bella T. (Y13), Karla C. (Y9), Amelia H. (Y9), Elanaz M. (Y8), Elena B. (Y8), and Ziren S. (Y8). Once Miss Mary Moo is returned to us, she will take pride of place in our Senior School to warmly greet visitors.
If you head over to the Grand Arcade to see Miss Mary Moo, we would love for you to take a ‘Moo-fie’ with her (a cow-based selfie) and send it to our marketing team or Ms Conroy for our social media pages #StMarysMoofie.
Mâché Moo project
To further extend the Cows About Cambridge concept, the Art and Design Department also engaged students in creating our very own herd of mini moos!
View our Gallery of Mini Mâché Moo designs
Ms Conroy
Return to Magnolian 2021