The Barn is the creative heart of Marbury. Every student from Junior Primary to Year 12 is encouraged to spend some time here. They have access as part of the Art curriculum, as part of the electives system and they are invited to negotiate for further access. Academic subject teachers alsodesign their lessons to allow students to work here in this creative centre. Teachers are aware that students can provide a richer response to their learning in, say, Science or English by spending some time in The Barn.
In The Barn students can make use of a sewing room, or can undertake work in a number of forms, including sculpture, painting, drawing, lino-cuts, collage, papier-mache, model-making, clay and basic carpentry.
Students are encouraged to explore their emotional responses through their time in the Barn; the work on this page and on the Students' Work page shows the results of this process. They can also assume a mentoring role in the Barn where they are encouraged to spend some time with the Junior Primary children. This often takes the form of helping the barn staff and Junior Primary staff with the younger children's art and sewing lessons.
The Barn was once just that. It was a harness room and a feed loft for the animals that lived on Wairoa when it was a private estate. The signs of its past life remain, from the beautiful brick floor with drainholes for the sluicing of stalls to the harness rings set into the wall. At one time a garage for Sir James and Lady Gosse, the building also served as a set for the film "Picnic at Hanging Rock". The film crew competely refurbished it in the original style by removing walls, doors and other modifications made when the school had set it up as the Art and Craft centre. The students, who had been given the week off to watch the filmig were impressed to see the young hero gallop out of the building and down the driveway. Although this shot took days to plan and execute, it never made it into the film!
