October Gallery
Location:
London
Web site:
www.octobergallery.co.uk Project Title: Creative Training
Lead Group: October Gallery, Bloomsbury, London
Partner Group(s): Actionspace, B2B, Education Volunteers
Artist(s): Danielle Dean
October Gallery, in central London, shows contemporary art from many cultures. Their creative training delivered a 'teaching-to-teach’ style programme of drawing workshops to their own volunteers, and to two other adult groups.
The Gallery decided to run nine creative training workshops, three for each group of participating adult learners: women from Somali community group B2B, young people aged 19 – 25 from Actionspace (which provides visual art projects for people with learning disabilities), and October Gallery volunteers. The aim of this programme was to support each group, over the three sessions, in planning, coordinating and delivering their own Big Draw event.
Training is considered an important aspect of the Gallery’s relationship with its volunteers who help run workshops there throughout the year. Through this project, the Gallery also hoped to build stronger relationships with B2B and Actionspace, who are both groups they plan to work with in 2010. Focusing on accessible themes of community and environmental awareness, the project aimed to introduce October Gallery to these groups as an inspirational and welcoming venue.
Actionspace
Creative training with Actionspace was devised to help the group develop the ideas, skills and confidence to run a Big Draw event in their own venue. The initial training day involved: inspiring them with ideas taken from October Gallery exhibitions, increasing their art and facilitating skills, building their confidence in working with the public on an art event and providing an opportunity to practice these skills in their own Big Draw event.
In the first session, Actionspace participants generated their own personal word associations, having explored the ‘EthKnowcentix’ exhibition in the gallery, concentrating on themes of storytelling and symbols. Each word was cut out and arranged to form a story; the basis for a series of drawings using mark-making tools through carbon paper. Noticing the repeated use of tattooing (tatau) in the artworks, the participants traced around their hands to frame their illustrations.
The second session took place at the Leighton Project. Working with themes from the first session, participants were told a Maui story. They traced the outline of relevant countries on a big map and illustrated a journey from one place to another, before drawing patterns and imaginings of what the place might look like. Participants worked on coloured card and with pastels. Their work was finally combined with the work from session one to produce a large patchwork quilt of stories and drawings connected with pipe-cleaners.
In the last session, also at the Leighton Project, Actionspace participants led their own workshop for the staff of Elfrida Rathbone Camden, a charity providing free services to people with learning difficulties, disabilities and families under stress. The visitors made postcard versions of drawings inspired by Actionspace’s patchwork quilt.
