Family Big Draw Weekend

The centre ran a weekend of workshops in the woods and meadows for over 1,000 visitors, using mixed media to raise awareness of the natural world.

Activities included

• drawing with grass
• making sensory mobiles from twigs, leaves and plants
• creating a triptych from woodland materials; and
• drawing with felt to decorate a tree with images of real or imaginary treasures below the roots and in its branches.

Families joined together to create a fantasy woodland from recycled materials in the marquee, or to use a printing press to make a collective textile banner inspired by nature.

Even adults literally threw themselves into mark-making with mud and clay, enjoying the challenge of producing life-size body prints, which became mud-angel banners hanging in the trees.

Music workshops, using instruments made from recycled items to accompany a youth band, concluded with a procession that wove its way around the artworks and noisily celebrated the creativity of every participant.

Grants from Arts Council England, Worcestershire Early Years and Childcare Services, and the Family Learning Network funded the artists at Bishops Wood and training sessions for practitioners and teachers at four Children’s Centres, which ran Mini Big Draws prior to this event.