Exhibition featuring art by local students highlights the importance of community

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This weekend will be the last chance for people to see an exhibition which features work from local school children. 

I’m Brave Because I Follow My Dreams is showing in the Winding House’s East Gallery until February 17. 

It was organised by Cardiff-based photographer Ffion Denman, 26, and features work from pupils from five schools, including Whiterose Primary School.

The project highlights the importance of community voices – including Welsh communities in Argentina and schoolchildren in the Upper Rhymney Valley.  

Ffion told Caerphilly Observer more about the project and said: “While I was in Argentina doing my photography project, I was also doing community outreach stuff in different schools and got very inspired by that work.”

Ffion added that she saw benefits when young people were left to have “creative freedom” without the pressure to be “perfect” – and wanted to replicate this idea at home in Wales.

Ffion worked with schools close to the Winding House, in New Tredegar, and managed the sessions – meaning students took control when it came to taking portraits and decorating them with accessories. 

They also created the backdrop, writing different ideas on it – one even became the exhibition’s title.

Ffion said: “The title of the work I’m Brave Because I Follow My Dreams came from one of the students at Whiterose who wrote that on the backdrop.

“It all spans around this idea of celebrating ourselves and our peers.” 

This is Ffion’s second exhibition at the Winding House – but this may not be a possibility soon as the council has proposed to mothball the venue as part of their proposed budget cuts.

Ffion hopes to do more work with schools in the future after enjoying this project so much. 

“It was amazing,” she said, adding that young people can often be underestimated. 

She continued:  “I don’t think people take their minds seriously enough, and what they have to say and how valuable their thoughts are.”

Students’ work from the exhibition