Art Club 1.03: Plants and flowers

THEME OF WEEK 1:03: Plants and Flowers

4th, 5th and 9th February 2015

Art Club with Fundación Junto Con Los Niños - JUCONI 

facilitated by the Charlotte Miller Art Project in Guayaquil, Ecuador

IDEA AND AIMS:  For the children to have fun working on some large scale collaborative pieces for their carnival cart. 

PROCESS: These workshops were realised in a number of different ways in the 4 different groups that we work with here in Guayaquil, to create a palm tree trunk and palm fronds plus lots of individual flowers.

1. Palm tree trunk: Facilitators pre-prepare a chicken-wire base for the trunk.  Children use modrock to create a solid layer around the wire that can later be decorated with fabric scraps. (This tree trunk caused a lot of issues, in large part because of damage during transport.  At the time of writing, having been through the hands of children in 3 sessions it is now in 2 halves and a-waiting some tlc in the office to be finished off!  Note to self for future workshops: create a strong skeleton inside the chickenwire and add a firm modrock base layer to make the structure more solid before the children being working on the sculpture.) 

2.  Palm fronds: In groups of 2 to 4 the children cover both sides of large pre-cut cardboard triangles with scraps of Fomix in various shades and textures of greens (or other colours if desired), and add further leaves that hang off the main branch.

3. Flowers: Individually the children take a cup cut from an egg box, place a stem through the centre using a pipecleaner and decorate it with felt and Fomix petals and a tissue paper centre.

MATERIALS: Tree trunk: chicken wire, wire cutters, thin wire, modrock, water and water bowls, scissors, string, fabric scraps and glue; Palm fronds: Fomix in multiple shades and textures of green, other colours of Fomix, green papers, glue, silicone, scissors, cardboard; Flowers: egg boxes, scissors, pipe cleaners, felt, silicone, glue, tissue paper.

The day that we ran this plant-making session in Socio Vivienda was also our last sessions with these children before the upcoming change to our groups, so the focus of the workshop shifted to be a celebration of their time with cmap and JUCONI in Art Club.  

In order to incorporate this with the plant-making we asked the children to answer two questions:

1. What have you learnt in Art Club?

2. What makes you special and unique?

The children decorated cardboard squares with their answers.  The intention here was that, even though the ending for these groups has come more abruptly than Emily, Ronald or I would like as facilitators, that the children would finish on a positive note, reflecting on what they will take with them from the groups and what makes them each a special and talented person. 

MATERIALS: cardboard squares, post-it notes in various colours, Fomix in various colours and textures, glue and scissors.

The plan is for the results to be hung from the palm trees once they are put together on the carnival cart.

Here is a sneak peak at some of the answers the children gave:

(above left) "I am unique and special because I am good at playing football, not fighting, not using bad words, painting and drawing" (right)  "In Art Club I learned to make drawings and paint with lots of colours!"

The kids answers to what they learned include: to draw and paint, to play, to make friends, to do lots of crafts, to make "Años Viejos", to be sociable, to share and answers to what makes them special and unique include: because I have learnt many things, because I am a good brother and do the chores in the house to help my mum, because I am a good friend, because I am good at dancing, because I am good at playing football.

Great answers!