Home Education Groups 

Our workshop offer for the 2025-26 academic year is below. Sessions cost £80. 

An Introduction to Visiting Art Galleries   

Suitable for early years groups (Nursery / Reception)  

Introduce your students to an art gallery in a fun and age-appropriate artist-led session. In this session, students will explore the Orleans House Gallery with our artist using exciting looking tools, before exploring our object boxes to make personal connections and to be imaginative and inquisitive. Finally, the students will have the opportunity to create their own drawing.  

Available October 2025 – July 2026    

Mark Making and Shadowscapes: Turner and Quantum  

New for 2025 - Suitable for Key Stages 1-3   

How can mark making develop your skills as an artist? How do quantum physics and art connect? What does a romantic artist and a contemporary artist with a PHD in quantum physics have in common?  

In this new Mark Making workshop for 2025, students will work with a professional artist to explore mark making techniques and approaches used by Romantic artist J.M.W Turner, before creating their own responses.  Students will also have the opportunity to complete a self-guided visit of the exhibition Shadowscapes: Turner and Quantum by contemporary artist Libby Heaney to discover her brand new immersive work, displayed alongside and in conversation with Turner’s sketches and paintings. A pack will be provided to guide classes through the exhibition. 

Available from October 2025 – February 2026  

Mark Making for Early Years Groups:  

Suitable for Reception  

How can mark making develop your skills as an artist?  In this workshop, students will work with an artist to explore different marks that we can make with a variety of materials, before taking inspiration from our exhibitions and collections to create their own drawing.   

Available October 2025-July 2026  

Mark Making  

Suitable for Key Stages 1-3 

How can mark making develop your skills as an artist?  In this workshop, students will work with an artist to explore different marks that we can make with a variety of materials, before taking inspiration from our exhibitions and collections to create their own drawing.   

Available March-July 2026 

Drawing with Wire:  

Suitable for Key Stages 2-3   

Learn about using line drawing to create a 3D design. Working with an artist, students will explore line drawing before using wire to create their own 3D drawing.    

Available April-July 2026  

Printmaking (Collagraph Printing):   

Suitable for Key Stages 1 and 2   

Explore printmaking techniques and use textures to build up a printing plate in this relief printing workshop. Students will find out about what printmaking is and develop their skills through exploring different drawing and printmaking processes.    

Available April-July 2026  

Visit our What’s On to see what exhibitions we have on.  

You can pick up one of our family trails, or use our sensory bags to guide your visit, or alternatively, you can use one of our Self-Guided Visits packs. 

Families in the Forest: this trail prompts visitors to engage with the gallery grounds. Pick up the trail from the Cultural Reforesting Exhibition. 

Family Trail: Use our question prompts to guide you through the galleries. Pick up from reception. 

Sensory bags: Borrow one of our bags full of lots of objects to prompt discussion. 

Pick up a self-guided visit trail: Designed by artist Abigail Hunt, we have a series of trails with questions designed for educational purposes.   There are three trails available 

1. Looking Differently – this trail is aimed at younger children

This tour includes practical and discussion-based activities to encourage exploring Orleans House Gallery both inside and outside. Students will engage with all their senses to place themselves within the different spaces, looking differently and thinking about how artworks make them feel or think.  

2. Change and Contrast

Look closely at Orleans House Gallery with your students and consider its histories, its future, and its present. Students will use this visit to reflect on how they are connected to the gallery and find inspiration in the building and the natural environment surrounding it.  

3. Place, Space and Materiality

Looking at the different spaces within Orleans House Gallery this tour encourages students to think about placing themselves as unique individuals within this fascinating location. Ideas for practical and discussion-based activities will encourage your students to take notice of the details within the architecture and the outside spaces as well as exploring the exhibitions.  

Shadowscapes: Turner and Quantum (9 October 2025 until 1 March 2026)

Turner 250 meets the 100-year anniversary of quantum physics in an exhibition at Orleans House Gallery. Dr Libby Heaney, award-winning artist with a PhD in Quantum Information Science will create a pioneering new immersive work, displayed alongside and in conversation with Turner’s sketches and paintings. Expanding on Turner’s experimental approach, Heaney will transform the gallery through a digital-quantum installation and her paintings.    

The conversation between Heaney’s work and Turner’s is wide-ranging, from exploring the dark and light of modern society, to fascination with cutting edge technologies and experimentation, as well as playing with the sublime and supernatural.    

We invite audiences to explore the radical nature of Turner’s practice through the ultra-contemporary lens of quantum tech. Viewers will be able to understand the fluid and non-binary nature of quantum computing through Turner’s use of washes, movement, shadow and invisible forces.   

Becky Lyons (Stables Gallery – 26 September until 23 November 2025)

Becky is a London based English-Jamaican artist using art to connect with and generate insights about ecology.  Becky’s work is manifested as installations combining sculpture, sensory materials, moving image, photographic objects and text. This exhibition is part of the Emerging Artist Programme. 

Winter Show (Stables Gallery – 28 November 2025 until 1 February 2026)

Our annual exhibition showcasing the talent of Richmond based artists. 

Xinan Yang (Stables Gallery – 6 February until 29 March 2026)

Xinan’s work weaves magical realism into the art of deconstructing photographs through painting, capturing her experiences of dislocation from her homeland and family, and creating a space that exists both in the realm of imagination and reality. This exhibition is part of the Emerging Artist Programme. 

Play and Imagine (2 April until 31 August 2026)

Join us for another interactive exhibition which explores the importance of playing and our imaginations. More information to follow soon. 

Sequoia Barnes (Stables Gallery – 3 April until 7 June 2026)

Sequoia is a textile artist and sculptor who specializes in ceramics/pottery, quilting, soft sculpture, stitching/embroidery, installation, and assemblage. Her work often mixes these different genres via the influence of Black Southern Assemblage. This exhibition is part of the Emerging Artist Programme. 

Richmond Upon Thames College Show (Stables Gallery – 12 June until 26 July 2026)

Our annual showcase of work from Richmond Upon Thames College students is back. More information will be available soon.