Students at ACS Cobham International School have taken part this term in an art project that connects them with their peers in China.

Students aged 12 and 13 have studied the work of Polish artist Miroslaw Balka and, with this inspiration, have created their own pieces of artwork with the theme of “rites of passage”.

They have also used the ideas of memory, history and identity - prevalent in Balka’s art - in their own work.

Once the artwork has been produced, images of it are posted on a website accessible to students at the International College in Hong Kong, allowing students to respond to each others’ work from across the globe.

The school in Portsmouth Road said the “turbinegeneration” project, which was organised by Tate Modern and sponsored by Unilever, was the first online educational partnership linking schools with major international galleries. It also offered the chance for art students to communicate with art students in China.

Marjorie Williams, who teaches the school’s art studio class, said: “We are very enthusiastic about this new online project, which is allowing a number of ACS Cobham’s students the chance to be actively involved in the creation of art as well as also providing the opportunity for cultural interaction with another group of students in a different country for feedback on their work.”

Organisers of the project hope it will encourage young artists to consider art in the context of literacy, geography, social studies, history and technology, rather than as a subject in isolation.