Student Manuscript Project
Inspired by medieval manuscripts and artefacts, 160 students from Ireland and Switzerland have created two books for the exhibition, Words on the Wave: Ireland and St. Gallen in Early Medieval Europe at the National Museum of Ireland at Kildare Street.Words on the Wave: Ireland and St. Gallen in Early Medieval Europe
The students are studying at the Flade Klosterschulhaus, St. Gallen, which is beside the Abbey Library of St Gall in Switzerland, and at Coláiste Muire, Ballymote, Co. Sligo, Eureka Secondary School, Kells, Co. Meath and Gallen Community School, Ferbane, Co. Offaly.
The teenage students participated in workshops at the museum, in their classrooms and online, with calligrapher Timothy O’Neill, Museum educators, and their teachers. With replica objects and materials, they created oak-gall ink, ground plants and minerals to make pigments, and mastered medieval insular script and intricate interlace design. They also discovered the ancient links between Ireland and Switzerland and life in each other’s countries.
The Manuscript
Their artwork reflects their views of the world today, the new artistic skills they learnt, and their learnings about the medieval period. As their designs are displayed within book format in the exhibition, this document shows images of all the art they created, so each page can be appreciated in full. Accompanying each piece of art are translations of any calligraphy into the three main languages used by the schools participating, Irish, English and German. The students also have written a short piece describing the inspiration for their designs. The students were given a brief to create art inspired by their thoughts about the world, the natural world, their culture, and what writing and art they find inspiring.Their 65 designs show great creativity and breadth of interest, and care about their world and fellow human-beings. They are inspired by a multiplicity of areas, including sport, music, poetry, pastimes, experiences, ideas and nature.
To view a digital version of the manuscript please click the image of the students manuscript cover.
Student Manuscript Project Video
Curriculum links
Leaving Certificate Art HistoryThe Visual Studies Framework
- The framework is structured around six elements: Context, Artists and Artworks, Analysis, Art Elements and Design Principles, Media and Areas of Practice, Innovation and Invention. When studying a period/movement, these elements should be used to understand what occurred before the period/movement being focused on, the period/movement itself and any effects of the period/ movement on later ideas or artwork.
- Ireland and its place in the wider world: Insular Art (c.500 - 1100s).
Leaving Certificate Chemistry
Skills - Students should be able to
- Follow instructions given in a suitable form
- Perform experiments safely and co-operatively
- Select and manipulate suitable apparatus to perform specified tasks
- Make accurate observations and measurements
- Interpret experimental data and assess the accuracy of experimental results.
Junior Certificate History
Strand one: The nature of history
Working with evidence
- Investigate the job of the historian, including how s/he finds and uses evidence to form historical judgements which may be revised and reinterpreted in the light of new evidence
- Debate the usefulness and limitations of different types of primary and secondary sources of historical evidence, such as written, visual, aural, oral and tactile evidence; and appreciate the contribution of archaeology and new technology to historical enquiry
Recognising key change
- Investigate the lives of people in one ancient or medieval civilisation of their choosing, explaining how the actions and/or achievements of that civilisation contributed to the history of Europe and/or the wider world