sara holmes
Selected Community Projects, Events & Exhibitions
Sara has lead and been part of many local community projects as well as high profile metropolitan events and exhibitions.
National Trust at Runnymede
Is the site where King John signed the Magna Carta, England’s great icon of liberty and first expression of human rights, on June 15, 1215.
‘Haymaking’ – In October 2021 as part of a week long artist in residency Sara lead workshops with a variety of community groups. Each group made four figurative sculptures to eventually form part of a bigger scene. A sixteen piece installation, telling the story of Haymaking from a the pre-industrialised past. The installation stands in a hay meadow at the site of the Magna Carta at the Runnymede National Trust. A scene which depicts community, was fittingly created by the community, for the community.
As part of this project Sara was also commissioned to create ‘The Scyther’. He stands at around eight feet tall and is exhibited alongside the ‘Haymaking’.
Royal Academy of Arts London – Summer Exhibition 2018
As part of the Summer Exhibition’s celebrations Sara was very honoured to be invited by The Royal Academy of Arts to lead a workshops with the general public making willow bees, dragonflies and butterflies. Allowing Sara to exhibit her own installation, a group of five giant bees, in the courtyard alongside Anish Kapoor’s amazing installation ‘Symphony for a Beloved Daughter’.
London 2012 Olympic Games – ‘Inspire’ Woking.
As part of Wokings celebrations and involvement in the the cycling events of the 2012 Olympic Games, Sara lead an award winning project in collabortion with Woking Borough Council. Some 5,000 schoolchildren, from 15 primary and secondary schools in the Borough, worked with Sara to create over 60 life-size willow cyclists over 11 months leading up to the Games. Inspired by the Games promise to connect people to sport and the Olympic and Paralympic values it provided the children participating a tangible link to this historic event. Woking’s willow sculptures so impressed the London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games (LOCOG) and Paralympic Games, that it awarded the project the prestigious Inspire Mark. The Inspire Mark recognises innovative and exceptional projects that are directly inspired by the London 2012 Games and enables non-commercial organisations to link their projects to the London 2012 Games in an official scope.
Sara’s own sculptures were also exhibited in and around Woking. Two willow cyclists were first displayed at the entrance to Jubilee Square and were then mounted to the side of the fire station tower on Victoria Way as you enter the town.
‘Surrey Hills’ was a large installation inspired by the cycling event and the route it took through the Surrey countryside. This was subsequently purchased by Woking Borough Council and is now displayed in the Wolsey Centre shopping mall.
