Like Pablo Picasso, Salvador Dali and Andy Warhol, Bathgate School pupils are strutting around with an air of confidence this week.
Why? Because it is not every day that primary school pupils beat secondary school pupils in an art competition.
Bathgate Park School competed in the Otago-Southland Showquest Competition, held in Invercargill last term, and during the past two weeks, photographs of their costumes have been judged alongside other costumes around the region by a panel of adjudicators.
The school was recently told it had won the wearable arts component of the regional competition.
''It's an amazing feat for a primary school who was up against high school competitors,'' artist in residence Janet de Wagt said.
To be a part of Showquest, teams of pupils create, produce and perform an original theatrical production consisting of pupil-designed and constructed costumes and props, presented in a choreographed, themed mini-spectacular.
An optional component of the competition was to design a piece of art, to be worn as a costume, by one of the performers.
Ms de Wagt said the pupils had been working on the wearable art for two terms and were very excited by the result.
She said the school's performance was about the amount of plastic washing up on the shores of Pacific islands, and how it could be repurposed.
Because many of the pupils had Pacific Island heritage, the theme was very close to their hearts, she said.
As part of the theme, they ''reused'' discarded materials such as calendars, wallpaper and dress-making patterns.
''We have an ethos in the art room - to repurpose or reuse materials.''
It aimed to show pupils how materials could be manipulated to create new or different things.
