Assignment #1 – Art in the Park

The aim of this assignment was to explore people”s barriers to being creative. It turned out though to develop into how to engage people in creative pursuits as well as how to organise a creative event.

I am blessed to belong to a conservation group (Bolton NEWT) who run regular events for local people and so I already had a platform, support and equipment for staging such an event. It was called Art in the Park and was advertised on Facebook as well as on a few posters dotted around. I initially wanted to encourage people to make their own mini wire figures and clay heads and came up with the idea of ‘create your own super hero’. This then extended to painting super hero masks and creating mini playgrounds or gardens for the wire super heroes.

I was lucky enough to have a very talented friend (chairman of the conservation group) offer to make a video to advertise the event and this then went on Facebook. He also created the fab poster. A number of other friends also volunteered to help at the event and was so grateful for all their support.

We had around 80 people come, even though the weather was dubious and it was wonderful to see the children and adults engage in theit own creativity. Many of the children wanted the adults to do it for them or said that they didn’t know how to create their own figures etc. I was careful to show people the techniques and then see what they then went on to make. The clear message was that there is no right way sanded making mistakes can be more fun than getting it right. I think I need to plant messages around the place next time saying things like ‘there is no right way’, ‘have a go, there is no wrong’. Hopefully better messages than these. I’ll have a think.

Here are some of the photos of the day. More reflections will come, I’m sure.