Ref. 73198-30 Maya Moni and Jamie Bryon, of Covingham Park Infants School with part of the collage pupils have made from recycled materials based on Degas' (INSET) painting Beach SceneCHILDREN from a Swindon school may see their artwork hung in the National Gallery alongside pictures by the likes of Leonardo Da Vinci, Raphael and Turner.

The pupils of Covingham Park Infants School are taking part in a national competition called Take One Picture, which aims to find the most creative schools in the country.

Their challenge was to design and make their own version of the Edgar Degas painting, Beach Scene.

And the masterpiece they have created now takes up a whole wall of the school hall.

Headteacher Moyra Holmes, said: "We wanted our piece to have an ecological theme because environmental issues are very important to the school.

"It is made of lots of different recycled materials and the whole school took part.

"The children created a wall of sandbags, all painted with different colours.

"They also painted pots and wrote messages on them about pollution to form part of the picture.

"We cut out lots of pictures of green umbrellas and stuck them on using decoupage.

"And we made willow sculptures from the willows planted around the school and covered them with pink sails and green umbrellas."

Schools from across the country are taking part in the competition and only a few schools' work will be selected for display in the National Gallery.

Moyra hopes the environmentally friendly message behind the school's piece will make it stand out

"It would be a prestigious invitation to be invited into the National Gallery," she said.

"The best thing about it would be that we would be able to promote environmental education and how it works in our school.

"The pupils would be very happy if they won the competition and so would the staff."

An art expert from the National Gallery is visiting the school to inspect the piece in December.

A decision is expected to be made by the end of the year.

Diana Milne