Key Stage

KS3 (ENG), KS4 (ENG), KS3 (NI), KS4 (NI), CfE L4 (SCO), CfE L3 (SCO), KS3 (WAL), KS4 (WAL)
Art term

Clay modelling, Casting and bronze, Scottish art and artists
Created by

Art UK
Topics

Animals, wild, Animals, domestic

Kenny Hunter's sculpture 'Yield Brother' in a school workshop

About this resource

What is our relationship with animals? How can we express this in sculpture?

This resource is inspired by a workshop led by Scottish artist Kenny Hunter with CfE Level 3 and 4 (KS 3 equivalent) students at Forrester High School in Edinburgh. Focusing on his sculpture Yield Brother the resource explores ideas relating to how humans see and interact with animals, a subject Hunter addresses in many of his sculptures.

This resource offers ideas and suggestions for:

exploring the sculptures of contemporary artist Kenny Hunter
encouraging students to look in-depth at artworks and discuss their responses
developing research, planning and technical skills by making a clay sculpture of an animal

This Art and Design resource offers a series of activities that can be used together as a lesson plan or as individual components to integrate into your own scheme of work. It is devised for CfE Level 3 and 4 / Key Stage 3 students but may also suit CfE senior phase / Key Stage 4 students.

National Curriculum for England

Art and design
- Evaluate and analyse creative works
- Actively engage in the creative process of art
- Know about great artists and understand the historical and cultural development of their art forms
- Produce creative work, explore ideas

Northern Ireland Curriculum

Art and design
- Developing students' own personal and creative responses
- Developing creative thinking skills through designing and making

Scotland's Curriculum for Excellence

Art and design
– I have experimented with a range of media and technologies to create images and objects, using my understanding of their properties (EXA 3-02a)
– Through observing and recording, I can create material that shows accuracy of representation (EXA 3-04a)
– I can respond to the work of artists and designers by discussing my thoughts and feelings. I can give and accept constructive comment on my own and others' work (EXA 3-07a)

National Curriculum for Wales (2008)

Art and design
- Students use their knowledge about the work of other artists to enrich and inform their work through analysis and evaluation
- Students use a variety of processes
- Students evaluate their work through discussion
- Students explore, experiment with and apply the visual, tactile and sensory language of art

New Curriculum for Wales (2022)

Expressive Arts

Exploring the expressive arts is essential to developing artistic skills and knowledge and it enables learners to become curious and creative individuals.

Progression step 4:

I can explore and experiment with my own and others’ creative ideas, demonstrating increasingly complex technical control, innovation, independent thinking and originality to develop my work with confidence, being able to explain my reasons behind choices made and evaluate their effectiveness on my creative work

I can explore creative work, understanding the personal, social, cultural and historical context, including the conventions of the period in which it was created.

I can investigate and understand how meaning is communicated through the ideas of other artists and performers.

Progression step 5:

I can explore and experiment with my own creative ideas and those of others, demonstrating technical control, innovation, independent thinking and originality, showing confidence to take risks and developing resilience in order to overcome creative challenges.

I can investigate and analyse how creative work is used to represent and celebrate personal, social and cultural identities.

Responding and reflecting, both as artist and audience, is a fundamental part of learning in the expressive arts.

Progression step 4:

I can effectively evaluate my own creative work and that of others showing increasing confidence to recognise and articulate strengths, and to demonstrate resilience and determination to improve.

I can apply knowledge and understanding of context when evaluating my own creative work and creative work by other people and from other places and times.

I can evaluate the effectiveness of a wide range of artistic techniques in producing meaning.

Progression step 5:

I can critically and thoughtfully respond to and analyse the opinion and creative influences of others in order to independently shape and develop my own creative work.

I can critically evaluate the way artists use discipline-specific skills and techniques to create and communicate ideas.

Creating combines skills and knowledge, drawing on the senses, inspiration and imagination.

Progression step 4:

I can use my experimentation and investigation to manipulate creative work with purpose and intent when communicating my ideas.

I can apply specialised technical skills in my creative work.

I can purposefully use my design skills and apply a range of solutions to clarify and refine final creative ideas.

I can draw upon my experiences and knowledge to inform and develop strategies to overcome creative challenges with imagination and resilience.

Progression step 5:

I can synthesise and apply experience, knowledge and understanding with sophistication and intent when communicating my ideas.

I can use professionally established, discipline-specific techniques confidently and convincingly in my creative work and work towards industry standard.

I can use effective strategies to take risks with my own creative work and can display resilience to overcome creative challenges.

Introducing Kenny Hunter

Scottish artist Kenny Hunter (b.1962) uses sculpture to question the contemporary world and its values. He adopts the forms and techniques of traditional sculpture, but his unconventional choice of subject makes us think about what sculpture is and who or what it should depict.

In this video, Kenny Hunter describes his approach to making sculpture and his interest in using and questioning traditional forms of sculpture. He also introduces two recent graduates of Edinburgh College of Art who engage with traditional and conventional materials and processes to make their sculptures.

Explore Kenny Hunter’s sculptures on Art UK

Visit Kenny Hunter’s website

Animals and us

Many of Kenny Hunter's sculptures explore our complex relationship with animals: how we see them, how we live with them, how we treat them, and what they symbolise.

Look at these two photographs of the sculpture Yield Brother with your class.

Activity: what do you think?

Ask your students about their first impressions of Yield Brother. Use these nudge questions to help get the discussion going:

Do you think the sculpture is finished?
What is the expression on the ape's face? (Is it smiling? Is it angry?...)
How would you react to the sculpture if you saw it in an art gallery?
The title of the sculpture is 'Yield Brother' – what does 'yield' mean? Does the title provide any clues as to what the artwork is about?

About Yield Brother

The sculpture Yield Brother raises lots of questions and is not quite what it seems.

Is it finished?

It looks half-finished as if Kenny Hunter has started to carve the ape's face from a block of marble or plaster but has not finished the rest of the head (and perhaps the rest of the ape!). We can see the tool marks around the edge of the block.

In fact, the sculpture is finished and Hunter has tricked us. The sculpture is not carved but is made from acrylic resin, cast to suggest a half-carved block of marble or plaster. This photograph shows an art technician unpacking the sculpture for the school workshop and revealing the sculpture as a hollow resin shell, not a solid block.

Kenny Hunter's sculpture 'Yield Brother' being unpacked for a school workshop

What is it about?

Like all of Kenny Hunter’s sculptures, the subject is ambiguous. It is difficult to say whether the ape is grimacing or smiling. The title too is ambiguous. The word 'brother' suggests our evolutionary link to the ape, but what does he mean by 'yield'?

There are two definitions of 'yield': to produce or provide (as used in agriculture, for example, 'a good yield of a crop'); and to buckle or give in under pressure.

Who is doing the yielding – us or the ape?
Or does Hunter use 'yield' to suggest something provided – perhaps suggesting our debt to our primate ancestors?

There are no clear interpretations or right answers, just ambiguous clues and hints – and trickery!

Monument to a Mouse 2010

Kenny Hunter (b.1962)

National Trust for Scotland, Robert Burns Birthplace Museum

Discussion: Monument to a Mouse

Look at another sculpture by Kenny Hunter with your class.

Again the artist presents us with a puzzle. It is a large-scale public sculpture, over two metres high and cast in iron. (You may need to explain to your students that a public sculpture is a sculpture that is made for a public place.)

Discuss the sculpture as a class using these nudge questions if helpful:

What are your first reactions to the sculpture?
The sculpture is bigger than a person, what would you think or feel if you encountered it?
Does the sculpture show something you would expect to see, celebrated in this way?
What do you think the artist was trying to say with the sculpture?
The sculpture is located in the Robert Burns Birthplace Museum – does this provide any clues as to the sculpture's meaning?
Who do you think should be represented in public sculpture?

Questioning public sculpture

There are many large public sculptures dotted around our towns and cities. These sculptures usually represent rich or important people and were commissioned to pay tribute to them.

Spencer Compton Cavendish (1833–1908), 8th Duke of Devonshire

Monument to a Mouse is a sculpture of a tiny creature that is generally considered a pest.

By using a form of sculpture usually reserved for wealthy or important people to depict the mouse, Hunter subverts our expectations about who or what should be commemorated in sculpture. He makes us question what we are looking at – perhaps inviting us to see the humble mouse in a new light. The title of the sculpture is Monument to a Mouse, suggesting that he intends the sculpture as a tribute to, or celebration of, the mouse.

'Wee, sleekit, cowrin, tim'rous beastie'

Monument to a Mouse is located at the Robert Burns Birthplace Museum in Ayr, Scotland. It was inspired by Robert Burns's poem To a Mouse, written in 1785. The poem describes Burns's remorse at destroying the nest of a field mouse while ploughing and reflects on man's domination of, and destructive relationship with, nature. It goes on to reflect on the injustices that many poor people suffer.

Kenny Hunter's sculpture does not depict the 'Wee, sleekit, cowrin, tim'rous beastie' described by Burns, however. The mouse is huge and powerful looking. Hunter has humorously reversed our relationship with it – so perhaps we become the 'wee cowering beasties' as we look at the massive mouse!

Ask your students who they think should be represented in public sculpture.

Activity: us and them – what do you think?

'We exploit them, worship them, breed them and sacrifice them. Depending on where you live in the world animals can be considered as either pets, food, vermin or symbols of national identity or used as a metaphor in language.' – Kenny Hunter

Study – David Attenborough with ‘Jane’ (Chimpanzee), First 'Zoo Quest' (1954)

Before leading his workshop at Forrester High School in Edinburgh, Kenny Hunter asked the students to think about our complicated, and often conflicted, relationship with animals by responding to a series of questions.

Task your students with thinking about these questions. This could be a whole class activity or students could consider the questions individually and then share their responses as a class.

Can you think of three animals people live with as pets?
Can you think of three animals people eat?
Can you think of three animals people consider pests or vermin?
Can you think of three animals considered as emblems for nations or other groups, such as companies, sports clubs, etc.?
Can you think of three animals used in language to express a human quality? Such as 'brave as a...'
Lastly, do any of the animals you have thought of performing more than one of these roles?

Activity: make a clay animal sculpture – with meaning!

Task your students with making a clay sculpture of an animal, inspired by Kenny Hunter’s sculpture Yield Brother, and by the ideas and questions explored in this resource.

It may be helpful for students to prepare for the activity in advance by collecting images of the animal they would like to sculpt, for reference.

Materials

Students will need:

Clay
Clay tools
Paper and a pencil (to sketch and note down ideas)
Photographs of animals as source material

Activity instructions

These activity instructions are written for students to follow.

Step 1. Research ideas

Think about the ideas you have explored in discussing Kenny Hunter's sculptures. Decide on the animal that your sculpture will represent.

It could be an animal that humans have a relationship with – such as a pet.
It could be an animal that is used as an emblem for a country or a football team.
It could be an animal that we associate with a human attribute such as bravery or stubbornness or determination.

Browse artworks that depict animals on Art UK's website for ideas

Step 2. Plan your sculpture

Using your research ideas and any photographs you have collected as source material, plan your sculpture. It might help to sketch some ideas first.

Think about how you want your animal to come across:

what qualities does the animal have, and how do we as humans see these qualities?
is it an animal we are scared of or dislike? Is it an animal we admire or see as brave? etc.
how would you show these qualities?
perhaps you could question or overturn our ideas about the animal, as Kenny Hunter did with his Monument to a Mouse

Tip! As your sculpture will be made from clay, avoid thin legs, long necks or horns that might break. (Crocodiles good – storks bad!) Plan to depict your animal lying down, or if you are sculpting a bird, tuck its wings in.

Have a look at these sculptures of animals for inspiration – not a spindly leg or long neck in sight!

Cat c.1935 William George Simmonds (1876–1968)
Animal, Bird and Insect Sculptures unknown artist
Two Long-Eared Animals* unknown artist
Bird 1997 Breon O'Casey (1928–2011)
Sleeping Fawn 1913 Henri Gaudier-Brzeska (1891–1915)
Dog 1914 Henri Gaudier-Brzeska (1891–1915)
Persian Tiger 2011 Debbie Lawson (b.1966)
Wolves at the Door 2017 Derek Cunningham and Ivan Navarro
Walrus 1999–2000 Andrew Burton (b.1961)
Frog James Shelliker (active 2017–2019)
Owl 2019 James Shelliker (active 2017–2019)
The Cheshire Cat 2012 Simon Hedger
Hedgehog Carving 2013 Graham Jones (active 2013)
Recumbent Lions 1888 or before Antoine Durenne (1822–1895)
Concrete Hippo 1972 John Wood (active 1972)

Step 3. Sculpt your animal

Sculpt your animal in clay using clay tools. Start by forming the basic body shape...

Student sculpting the form of an elephant in clay

... then add details to your animal.

You could use clay tools to make marks to suggest fur.

Student adding details to their clay animal sculpture

You could add tiny flat bits of clay to suggest scales or feathers. (Stick them to your sculpture using a bit of water – if you scratch the back of the 'scale' first it will stick better!)

4. Enjoy your hard work!

You now need to leave your clay animal to dry before it can be fired in the kiln. As a class, discuss the sculptures you have made.

What relationship do the sculpted animals have with humans?
How have the characteristics and features of the animals been suggested in clay?

Animal sculptures made by students at Forester High School in Edinburgh

Extension activity

Explore public sculpture with your students. Kenny Hunter is often commissioned to produce public sculptures. He uses traditional forms and techniques but chooses subjects that question who should be on the pedestal. His bronze sculpture Girl with a Rucksack, which is mounted on a tall column in New Gorbals in Glasgow, shows a young woman with a backpack hanging from one shoulder and a bag at her feet. (She looks as if she is waiting for a bus...)

Research public sculptures in your area with your students.
Task them with designing a public sculpture depicting who they think should be on a pedestal.

You can find lots of public sculpture on Art UK's website. Use the map view feature to discover public sculpture in your area

Use these Art UK learning resources to explore public sculpture and find some sculpture design tips!

Telling stories through sculpture

Animate public sculpture

Henry Moore and Harlow

Kenny Hunter: artist website

Kenny Hunter in Conversation

Robert Burns Birthplace Museum

BBC Bitesize: To a Mouse

Masterpieces in Schools: Kenny Hunter inspires Edinburgh teenagers to give clay a go 25 September 2019, Shane Strachan
Art UK Home School: who's on the pedestal? 30 July 2020, Sam Ayre
Six Scottish Robert Burns statues 22 January 2020, Rhona Taylor
A sculpture for Tillydrone: an Aberdeen community gets creative 28 June 2021, Shane Strachan