This year the school’s annual art exhibition brought parents and grandparents into the school for an ‘Arts Alive Expo’, involving an afternoon of art activities with special guest workshops.

School arts leader Karolyn Davidson said the emphasis was on ‘tuning into art’, encouraging pupils to think about themselves as artists and to grow in their awareness of art throughout daily life.

“It’s also about encouraging them to think of themselves as artists, to wear that badge and be really proud that ‘I am an artist’,” Ms Davidson said.

The resulting exhibition was formally opened on Tuesday by Launceston College assistant principal Rebecca Miller, who worked with St Leonards Primary as the curriculum teacher leader for the arts and helped develop the program.

She said the focus had been particularly on encouraging students to think about art across the curriculum and how it applied to all their classes.

More than 130 pupils contributed, their artworks on show for a delighted crowd of family and some residents of the Mount Esk aged care facility just down the road.

Pupils used oil pastels, photography, paper cut-outs, computer 3D art, watercolours and pencils, as well as a striking display of tribal masks made out of Relbia clay.

Grade 6 pupil Stella Reid, 12, said her featured artwork was a recreation of Van Gogh’s final painting.

She said she liked art “because you don’t have to be the same thing”.