HAF Easter Programme

HAF is a national Department for Education funded programme that enables eligible young people to attend free activities and experiences and includes a hot lunch.

You can find out more about it here.  

This Easter the Herbert offered 10 days of activities including workshops with professional artists.  

Layla Tutt led a textiles workshop. In this taster session young people were introduced to Batik, Wet felting, Embroidery and Weaving.  

Whilst Batik is a specialism of hers, Layla is now exploring natural dyes and often offers workshops for adults.

You can follow her on Instagram to keep up to date with her work @laylatutt_art, and @laylatutt for music.  

Yusuf Seidu Okus is an artist working sustainably with upcycled materials. In his workshops young people made mixed media collages out of ‘junk’.  In the spirit of Easter and the museums interest in dinosaurs' young people were encouraged to depict one of their modern cousins – chickens. Yusuf taught them how to compose their pieces for the most striking results. 

Yusuf will be exhibiting some of his work at the Herbert this Summer. In the Meantime you can see what he’s been up to by following him on Instagram @ yusuf_seidu_okus 

Amara Piparia Lea, took her group into the galleries to soak up the last of the Collecting Coventry exhibition. Here they made studies of the Natural History collection through collage. They used these studies to then make fun textured paintings using different tools and different types of acrylic paint.  

You can learn more about Amara’s illustration on her Instagram @amarapiplea.  

Amara Lawrence (that’s me!) also led a session where young people got to personalise pencil cases using beaded keyrings, iron on patches, posca pens and handmade pin badges.