Back on track!

I've been absent from the blogg for some time now (almost a year!)  - but now I'm back! Blogging had lost some of its allure, but recently I've been feeling that I missed many things with it - documenting my process, regularly formulating myself about what I'm doing and where I'm heading...

I've not been idle though, among many things  I participated in artmadethis.

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another wallpainting project

 Last week I lead a wallpainting project at a school - or maybe I should say two projects?
The school kids under 13 had the theme "pixelated" and worked in their part of the school. The older ones had the limitation to make their sketches out of coloured paper - in order to simplify -  like in the wallpainting projects I've lead the other years.

the kids' murals 3 & 4

the kids' murals 1 & 2

I must say I'm very happy with the results of this pedagogic mural project - especially considering that the kids are just 15 years old. It worked even better this year than last year. I think the explanation is both that they school kids had seen what was made last year and therefore grasped the idea faster  - and because I improved my teaching and especially the organisation of the painting day. I wouldn't mind doing this kind of project every year - and keep improving! I love the challenge to get people to understand the power of simplifying; clean shapes and limited colours. The idea becomes so much more important ... They were just given some specific colours to use - and not allowed to use the red, green and yellow you can see in the first mural with the traffic light. But I told the boys that of course you can break the rules if you have a very good idea and reason (one of them had secretly gotten the coloured papers that they really wanted to use ... I think that shows initiative!). I told them to make their suggestion both with the subtle colours they were supposed to use - and with the strong colours they wanted to have. And present both suggestions ... [tomorrow: mural 3 & 4]

a long day painting

We achieved great results today, but I'm a bit too tired (I worked 11,5 hours non-stop) to share more than this right now - so you will have to wait to see the fantastic paintings in their completed versions!

Tomorrow: painting murals

one of the chosen suggestions made by the school kids Tomorrow we'll paint 4 murals. 11 school kids (age 15), their art teacher and me. Cross your fingers for us. I'll have to be there really early (07:00) so I better go to bed now - goodnight! [I'll share some more photos from KKV next week]

pedagogical mural project: more

whole suggestion (with the wolves) and details from what the school kids did today

pedagogical mural project - year 2

This spring I've been working with a mural project within Creative School again - same school and based on the same idea (we're continuing so to say).These are the suggestions  finished today with one of the classes (they've been working in groups). Tomorrow I'll have a long and (hopefully) concentrated day with the rest of the kids and then I'll show you some more results. The actual painting of the murals will happen next week (Friday). Here you can see photos from last year's pedagogical mural project.

pedagogical mural project III

It has been a long day, the kids were absolutely great and now it is done.
Tomorrow I will rest.

pedagogical mural project II

The kids came up with several very different and really good suggestions per class, but unfortunately we could only choose a few of them for execution. This one wasn't chosen.

Last week we used an overhead projector to make masks to help us paint the murals (because of several practical reasons we couldn't use the projectors to sketch directly on the walls)

and then we cut out the masks

Tomorrow is the DAY: we will paint the 5 murals. Cross your fingers!

pedagogical mural project

detail

On Tuesday I will paint the 5 murals together with the schoolchildren. This was how I worked with them to come up with the suggestions.

The limitations for this project was as always time and money. We could just get ONE day to paint the murals, and as the budget was limited the materials had to be kind of cheap and I could just get 5 occasions per school-class to help them develop the ideas. (in addition they got 2 times with their art teacher).

So I gave the kids some limitations:
- figurative based on cut out silhouettes from magazines and newspaper (this way everyone would have a fair chance; the idea was the main thing). Then they could add other elements to bind the scenes together.
- the choice of 4 out of 7 subtle colour-tones for the silhouettes.
- the white wall should not be covered but be the base of the images.
- work in groups of 2-3 kids (initially everyone had to work this way individually before teaming up)

paper cuts for mural

Part of a larger image I made today to show the schoolchildren how you can think (took me almost an hour)

It's been almost 5 weeks since I worked with the schoolchildren (age 15) on the longer mural project. But tomorrow it's time again. The tricky things with this project is that we have so very little time; I have 5 lessons (1 hour each lesson) per school class to help them develop ideas, make sketches and prepare for painting the mural. (They are supposed to work without me as well, but just twice) And then just ONE day to execute the murals together with some of the children in FOUR different places in their school.

So the big challenges for me is to manage to help them achieve something good and something that won't take too much time to execute (and that they'll manage to work on without my constant help - I can not divide into four!).

My idea: We cut out human figures from newspapers and magazines as bases for coloured silhouettes (in a limited number of colours) which can be used in any creative way to make larger images. They first worked individually to get the idea and will now work in groups of 3 on a suggestion in scale 1:5.

The question: will they manage to come up with a finished suggestion in just 3 hours (3 lessons)? 3 hours is not very much time, is it?

They didn't finish the individual suggestions in 2 hours...

creative school

For me end of March has been all about working creatively with teenagers. Last week I started a mural project with schoolchildren (age 15) that is going to continue during spring. It will result in some murals beginning of June. Yesterday I was there and tomorrow too, but after that I won't be there until May.




day 1. 20 kids and I have started a mural on the theme musical instruments

Monday and today I've been spending (all day) in two different schools painting murals with kids (age 13-16) as part of their full week of creative school. Each school has had two days to make their murals (no preparations and sketches beforehand). I've been in charge of day 1 - and my college Eric Magassa of day 2. I wonder in which direction he will steer this mural? Most of the time we think in different ways.