How ‘nature painting’ is developing in the gallery.
A few weeks in and the artwork is really growing. It has been an interesting experience, leaving the paper on the walls and hoping that local people contribute. Both positive and negative experiences have been felt with this ‘collaborative community experiment’. My thoughts so far:
- My students are open, adventurous risk takers who embrace challenges and stepping out of their comfort zones. The majority greatly enjoyed the task, working freely and expressively in an intuitive and creative way.
- Local people have not welcomed the opportunity to contribute as I had hoped. Not being local makes it hard for me to really understand why this is, but I make assumptions that creativity is not fluid for the many, and people simply don’t know what to do, nor have the confidence to try.
- I tried to support creativity through leaving cutting/collage materials as well as pens. One person embraced this opportunity (see image in the gallery).
- A lot of local children only wrote their names and little more other than smiley faces or cartoon characters. There seems to be a real lack of imagination.
- There was little-no evidence that anyone responded to any of the images that I left out to inspire people. I even found some glued to the paper!
- Talking with some locals, I understood that art education is generally not considered of real importance in Norway. My own children attend local schools and appear to do little-no art (some handicrafts though), so this explains a lack of imagination and confidence in making art.
- My absence from the gallery means that I cannot leave paint materials, nor support art-making. Perhaps running some workshops will help?
The space is fantastic to allow making to happen. I would like to use it more as an atelier for myself, if only I had the time!