Spreading Our Artistic Wings

(Above, 1st card from Clara in Sergio Toral to me, we are the two figures in the drawing) "I don't want you to leave, I love you a lot.  Miss, I wish that you wouldn't go, but you need to leave, I wish you could teach me more, but you can't" / (2nd card, from Clara to Emily, also the drawings included) "Don't leave please, Thank you for all your support and teaching, I wish we could continue learning together in Art Club"

Again, in writing this in July from the UK, I am looking back on these sessions from a distance.  Emily's beautiful write up of this 4 week period of bringing our cmap sessions to a close with the children in Sergio Toral and Socio Vivienda can be read here, where there are also many more photos of our beautiful kids.

The principle aims of this period was to prepare our Art Club children to continue their artistic practise independently at home after Emily and my departure, especially as for the majority of the children our leaving was also the close of Art Club, as no more cmap volunteers are due to go to Ecuador, and to have the opportunity to say goodbye to one another. 

This was a 4-step process:

1. A place to draw, handmade sketchbooks: Using basic bookbinding and decorative techniques to transform recycled materials into a personal space for creating.

2. Experimenting with materials: exploring mark-making with ink and wax resist, charcoal and oil pastels, all materials which were to be included in the children's end-of-project art supply packs.

3. Creating an art storage space: using 3D construction techniques to build a personalised 'pencil case' to store art materials.

  

4. Congratulation certificates and goodbyes: each child made themselves a congratulations certificate for graduating from Art Club, that we facilitators could write messages in.  The kids also wrote goodbye messages for Emily and I in our sketchbooks, and we handed back their work from the previous 3 sessions, along with boxes of art materials for them to take home.

 

One of the messages that I received, from Daniela in Sergio Toral: "Quimi [Kimi] don't leave Guayaquil, I love you a lot, you have given me affection, love and respect." 

These were really emotional times and it was sad to say goodbye to these beloved kids, but these were also really happy and relaxed sessions, so it really was a beautiful ending. Here Emily and I are photographed with Lourdes, the lovely lady nicknamed "la novia de Ronald" (Ronald's girlfriend) due her amazing skills at Manabian cooking, at the front of the cabaña restaurant where we ate almuerzo (lunch) for $2 every Wednesday after our sessions in Sergio Toral.

 

Another aspect of Emily and my final couple of months in Ecuador was the partial hand-over of Art Club to local artists from the Asociación Cultural Las Peñas.  The Asociación had contacted JUCONI independently just when Emily and I were looking for artists to continue to run art workshops with our kids post-cmap.  Again, Emily wrote a beautiful explanation of this transition here on the cmap blog.

Since leaving JUCONI we have heard great reports from our colleagues there about the exhibition of the children's sculptures and paintings in Las Peñas on the 11th July, and are told that the Asociación is scheduled to run another 8 week project in August, so I'll look forward to hearing the updates coming next month!