ART WORKSHOPS

ART/PLAY/RISK uses ‘play’ as a research method, an educational tool, and a means of creating community connection. Below are examples of playful workshops and community engagement.

THE GIFT

The Gift is a new public artwork by Sanné Mestrom that will incorporate contributions from the community, via a series of drawing workshops.

The Gift is an ensemble of elements that come together to form a sculptural whole. In this work, it is intended that the viewer can walk around, past, and through the selection of elements, thereby becoming part of the artwork, blurring the usual boundaries between spectator and sculpture, and softening the separation of art and the poetics of everyday life.

These sculptures are evocative of architecture – with their concrete and bronze materials – yet they also speak of the body with playful curves and bold arcs.

 These sculptural forms are also expressive of the small objects coveted by my young son – his little hands fumbling with classical Platonic shapes, as he comes to understand the principles of form, line, and composition. The shapes, of course, form the ‘building blocks’ of great architecture. Architects including Frank Lloyd Wright spoke often of the lifelong influence these very simple, abstract building blocks had on their iconic buildings: "The maple wood blocks . . . are in my fingers to this day," said Frank Lloyd Wright, attesting to the influence of the ‘Froebel' blocks on his work. The original blocks – which we also play with at home - were developed by Friedrich Froebel in the 1830s for children to learn the elements of geometric form, mathematics, and creative design.

It is my hope that children and adults will get equal pleasure from these sculptures.

"That early kindergarten experience with the straight line; the flat plane; the square; the triangle; the circle! If I wanted more, the square modified by the triangle gave the hexagon, and the circle modified by the straight line would give the octagon. Adding thickness, getting 'sculpture' thereby, the square became the cube, the triangle the tetrahedron, the circle the sphere."

"These primary forms and figures were the secret of all effects . . . which were ever got into the architecture of the world".

Frank Lloyd Wright, from An Autobiography.

 COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT

The project engages the local Community in two ways:

 1.      Firstly, the local community is invited to participate in a series of creative drawing workshops, the outcomes of which will be etched into the final bronze sculptural elements.

 2.      Secondly, once installed the works will be ‘playable’ by the public. The sculptures will invite the public to physically engage with the works as one might in an outdoor living room.

Creative Drawing Workshops

We will be running two creative workshops for the local community in April at the Joynton Creative Cultural Centre in Zetland. These are free of charge and open to the public.

As children, many of us would engrave our initials on the old tree trunk down the back of the schoolyard and would run our fingers through freshly poured wet cement on the pavement on the street corner. These casual, irreverent gestures created a time capsule of sorts: each such mark left an impression of our existence in that particular place, at that particular time, and in this way, a precious moment of our childhood was preserved forever.

As adults, it’s hard to walk past such a site, once engraved by our own little hands and touched by our creative spirits, without peaking over to see if our initials are still there. Which of course they are. Our childhood-self has been immortalised.

In our Creative Drawing Workshop, participants are invited to inscribe a dream they have for themselves – possibly a short sentence, or a simple sketch; a process which they will be guided through. A love-letter to your future self, or perhaps to your grandchildren.