09/08/2010 by James.

Right now I’m occupied with thinking about the overlap in my practice between art, learning and interpretation, as in interpretation for heritage or environmental sites.

Most of my work at the moment falls into three main areas -

1. Developing interpretation materials for English Heritage/The National Trust by consulting creatively with children and young people, for Stonehenge and its surrounding landscape

2. Responding to the environment of College Lake Reserve in Bucks for Outdoor Culture to develop an installation for a bird hide and creative learning programme for a local school

3. Mentoring or providing professional development for artists, teachers and museum educators on the role of the arts/creativity in learning

I personally see all of this as my practice as an artist, because my practice centres around the role that art can play in supporting individuals to engage with the world around them, and in ways appropriate to them. However, I describe my role to different people in different ways depending on the context in which I’m working, because the popular image of what an artist is/does often doesn’t quite fit. This seems to stem from the image of the artist as being somehow separate from society, not someone with an integral role, apart from to entertain or provoke, or to make things pretty.

But can’t art be interpretation, can’t interpretation be art, and what is the relationship of both of them to learning?

I’m not going to try and answer these questions, in fact I’ll probably ask a lot more. What I’m interested in doing is looking at the role that artists can and do play within the field of interpretation and learning, and explore the relationship between these areas within my own practice.

When I was at college, studying Fine Art and making sculptures that explored the relationship of my body to the landscape around me, I was told by one tutor that my work was too beautiful. She told me that she wanted to be shocked, to be challenged. My response at the time was that that wasn’t what I wanted. I wanted to engage people, to connect with people and to seek to connect people with the material-reality of the world around them, through engaging them with my artwork. I wanted to encourage a kind of empathy with my experience as the maker, through our shared cultural and bodily relationships with the artwork. I wanted to start to set up a dialogue between them and me, via the materials and processes that led to the creation of the object, and so to the place where the materials might have come from.

In the 15 years since then, my work has developed to engage much more directly with other people, through participatory projects and creative learning initiatives, but the direct sensory experience of exploring a place, and making in response to that, has stayed with me.

I understand that there are lots of kinds of art and artists, and that not everyone is trying to achieve what I am. There are also various approaches to learning, and interpretation materials in heritage and environmental settings take various forms. But what links my work across these areas is the belief in the need for each individual to be given the opportunity to engage with a place, a material, an object, in ways that leave room for them, for their own personal context.

My installation at College Lake could well be seen as a form of interpretation. The other interpretation already on site could also be seen as art - illustrations of the species and habitats are placed around the site and work well. But what I want to offer at College Lake is an opportunity for engagement and learning through interaction with an artwork, within the context of a specific place, that could be said to be poetic, in that it offers more than the sum of its constituent parts. I hope that it will offer a chance to be moved or changed by the experience of that specific environment, rather than being purely illustrative.

So can, and should Museum and Gallery interpretation look to encourage a similarly individual, emotional and imaginative response to a place or an artefact? Can one work of art offer a ‘way in’ to another?

There are plenty of examples of artists carrying out residencies in Museums (see Art & Artefact: Museum as Medium by James Puttnam), of creating interventions that respond to or highlight the background of specific artefacts, but these tend to be temporary, and afterwards things tend to return to normal, like the ‘parachute’ art projects that pop up and fade away in schools. Some interpretation aims to evoke a place or time using film, sound or smell, but is this art? Is there room for an audience or participant to interpret and adapt the experience to fit their own needs and experiences?

My interest is in exploring how artists can facilitate more meaningful interaction with sites or exhibits, questioning assumptions, and giving permission for alternative interpretations to be discussed and shared, in ways that can be transformational for all involved. Can (should) Museums, Galleries and Nature Reserves look to work with artists on a longer term basis, to support a re-evaluation of what a site can look and feel like to visitors, and what they might gain from interaction with it?

As with successful artist-teacher partnerships, this could be beneficial for both partners, with artists offering alternative ways of presenting and interpreting artefacts or information, whilst gaining from the in-depth knowledge and experience of site (Museum, Reserve etc) staff/professionals.

My work in education, especially on behalf of 5×5x5=creativity, seeks to support a move towards permanent change - a move towards educational practice that is responsive to the needs of the participant, that places them at the centre of the learning experience. I see my work in this context as being socially embedded art. I am acting from a position within the system, working in partnership and effecting change through dialogue.

Can involving artists in developing interpretation do the same? Can interpretation evolve in ways that value and respond to the individual, and provide information, rather than simply placing emphasis on the ‘official’ story of an object for example? Can we release our grip on telling people what to think and instead start to focus on engaging and asking people what they think, supporting them to learn for themselves? (See ‘Curiosity’ at Bristol Museum & Art Gallery)

I was watching ‘Behind the Scenes at the Museum’ last night on BBC 4, filmed at The Freud Museum ( http://www.freud.org.uk ). The staff at the Museum seemed to be exploring similar issues to those mentioned here, with a new director looking to make the Museum appear less elitest, and a discussion amongst staff debating whether letting the objects on display speak for themselves or increasing the amount of interpretation would be best.

The programme seemed to infer that the office staff as theorists/academics took a different view to those staff who were more hands-on. Essentially the Museum was struggling to understand what their visitors wanted and who their visitors were; whether to focus on Freud’s theories or to draw on the life of the Freud family and their personal effects.

I guess that some of them were worried about ‘dumbing down’ and felt anxious about change. From my own work with Museums, there often seems to be a divide between those that conserve and study artfacts, and those that seek to encourage greater access to them. With interpretation lying at the  boundary between curation/research and learning/access, it isn’t surprising that there is some conflict.

But as a more creative approach to learning begins to creep into our schools and museums, encouraging more inclusive and person-centred practice, I think that Museum interpretation has a lot to learn and gain from it.

Its not about ‘dumbing down’, its about providing access to a wider range of people and encouraging greater dialogue, resulting in interpretation that is multi-faceted and responsive to the needs and interests of everyone. As people who explore the world around them in creative ways on a daily basis, artists could be the ideal partners in helping this to happen.

After all, what is the point of preserving artwork or wildlife at a specific site if we don’t seek to forge links between them and their local communities, to allow learning to take place in ways that are moving and meaningful to the individuals of that community, using the site as a valuable learning resource and raising awareness of its importance.

Art to me is not something separate that might occasionally seek to engage with society, it is a way of exploring and engaging with the world, which when embedded within our institutions can lead to powerful social and environmental change.

(For more discussion on co-creation of exhibitions with artists and the public, see Museums Association website)

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30/06/2010 by James.

Next week there’s an exhibition at The Stanley Picker Gallery, Kingston University, set up by the three settings involved in 5×5x5=creativity, in our new research cluster in Kingston Upon Thames.

The exhibition will include photographic and written documentation, together with artworks, to share the learning journeys of the children involved in the research, and of the artists, teachers and cultural organisations working alongside them.

Please follow the link below for more information, and see the Stanley Picker Gallery website for directions.

5×5×5_spg_exhibposter.pdf

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26/05/2010 by James.

Its that time of year again when the sun starts shining, the world turns green and projects swell up to fill all my time. Not that I’m moaning, after a quiet year last year its great to be busy again and brilliant to be meeting and learning from a real range of people and places.

Since I last wrote I’ve been continuing to travel up to NE London and work in partnership with Churchfields Infant School. The Year Two children’s journey through the sessions at school and in Epping Forest led them to want to make a nest inspired woven sculpture in the grounds which continues to evolve according to their developing ideas.The school have also placed new noticeboards within the playground containing documentation from the duration of the project (as well as on the school’s website), so that parents and other visitors can keep track of its progress.

The Reception children at the school were inspired by seeing this structure and worked with myself and a teacher to create/define their own space outside using canes, lengths of fabric, string and tape. It was wonderful to see them so engaged for so long. The conversations and the role play around the growing structure was so rich, with writing and mark-making onto flags and signs decorating the outer walls, stars taped to the floor and a telescope built into the walls, amongst lots of other things.

I’ve also been continuing to visit the 5 settings of the Kingston Upon Thames 5×5x5=creativity cluster, with the artists working in partnership with Nursery and Reception classes in schools and children centres.

Its been fascinating to get a glimpse of how groups of children, and the artists and educators working alongside them, have grown in confidence in expressing their ideas, exploring inner and outer spaces through a range of resources chosen to suit their needs and interests. An emphasis has been placed by the majority of settings, on researching how creative ways can be used to support children to access the outdoors and to build relationships, and on the days I’ve visited there have been clear links between settings in the way that children have used string and tape to create webs or traps - winding, wrapping and tying the features of the landscape and each other together.

Its something that keeps coming up for me recently, this connecting of people and places, both physically through children and young people’s play and investigations of the world around them, and socially as bonds are created and new relationships negotiated.

Recently I worked for The Salisbury Festival, the BTCV and Wiltshire Young Carers at Harnham Water Meadows near Salisbury. Here, on the Unearthing Stories project, a storyteller Jamie Crawford worked with the young people to tell and develop stories linked with the landscape and their own life experiences, they had a chance to carry out practical conservation work, and I introduced them to ways of working with willow, creating sculptures whose form and structure was drawn from the wildlife and features of the meadows - the pollarded willows, the nesting swans and the insects that fly and live along the rivers and ditches.

This last week I also worked at an Earlyarts Professional Development Day hosted by 5×5x5=creativity in Bath. The day was centred around the use of Intelligent Materials - open-ended recycled or natural materials that offer no prescribed use for the children (or adults) that play and make with them, so supporting the children to follow their own ideas. This time I shared my own approach to using found, natural materials, and offered the artists, educators, researchers and play-workers a chance to explore branches, leaves, bark and fir-cones together with raffia, wool and string.

And somewhere in between all this I have been making time for myself to enjoy the green lushness that Spring brings to my part of the world - watching foxes from up on the downs, tracking down a long barrow amongst the sweet honey scented bluebells of West Woods, and keeping an eye out for the pair of Red Kites that seem to have taken up residence somewhere near by.

From now on, although busy, things calm down a little and I can think again about how all this can inform my more individual work. I have been working on adapting an old jacket of mine with finds and marks, and have various other bits and pieces on the go, gathering, exploring and finding ways of connecting all those treasured finds and experiences together.

( A quick reminder, if you’re interested in creativity and learning, the Making Waves conference at Bath Spa Uni on 18th June should be an inspiring day. For more info download a programme from the 5×5x5=creativity website events page)

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17/03/2010 by James.

Information taken from the 5×5x5=creativity newsletter, sign up or read more on 5×5 at www.5×5x5creativity.org.uk

Creativity Conference - 18 June 2010 Bath Spa University: Making Waves

This year’s conference will offer opportunities to reflect upon and commit to shaping the future direction of learning and teaching that meets the needs of young people’s creativity.

Keynote speakers will address topics including creative values, transformation and the nature of creativity and include: Pat Chapman, Director of Schools, Creativity, Culture and Education (CCE), Shan Maclellan, Director of Learning at the Southbank Centre, London, Professor Anna Craft, Exeter University and Professor Iram Siraj-Blatchford, Institute of Education.

For details please contact Julia Butler: Julia@5×5x5creativity.org.uk

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03/02/2010 by James.

Things are busy again at the moment, with artists selected for the new Kingston-Upon-Thames 5×5x5=creativity cluster, and a professional development day happening with them and the schools on Friday.

I’m also in the process of setting up the Stonehenge Young People’s Panel with English Heritage, and have got an Art & Identity project next week with a secondary school in Highworth, so will add info and images from those as things develop.

Meanwhile, I’ve been grabbing calm moments to get out and see what’s happening. The light is changing now, I can feel Spring in the air and the bulbs are pushing slowly up out of the frozen soil.

I was up on a hill near us the other day, getting my dose of clear cool air and wide open space above the Vale of Pewsey.

The ground was frozen solid, and in the woods that cling to the side of the hill, the cold had frozen the most beautiful patterns into puddles and footprints in the once wet, sloppy mud, now frozen so hard that wet chalk grew stems of ice crystals and the imprints of raindrops that had fallen a day or two before, had been captured like miniature spiky, volcanic landscapes.

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14/12/2009 by James.

An opportunity for artists to join the new 5×5x5 cluster in Kingston… 

London Paid (£40k-50k pro rata) Part time Artform: combined arts, dance, music, theatre, visual arts   Contact: Penny Hay penny@5×5x5creativity.org.uk

Description

5×5x5=creativity in Kingston: call for artists (12 days work Feb - June 2010)

5×5x5=creativity is an action research organisation dedicated to supporting children and young people in their exploration and expression of creative ideas. Starting in February 2010, we are looking for five artists to work with five educational settings in Kingston in collaboration with five cultural centres. The project aims to demonstrate ways in which creativity can be fostered in all children and fire their interest in learning, will explore ways in which boys can be involved in, motivated by and succeed in their learning environments, influence educational practice by establishing creativity as an essential foundation of learning, produce research to demonstrate the value of creative enquiry, relationships and environments in helping children develop as confident, creative thinkers, and share the research findings as widely as possible, creating a legacy for the future and to provide integrated training and mentoring for participating teachers, artists and schools, including opportunities to collaborate.

Artists will be invited to apply for the project through Arts Council England and London Schools Arts Service. Artists will be paid for the equivalent of 12 days @ £200 per day. Artists will be responsible for their own national insurance and tax. All artists will need to be police checked.

Schedule
Selected applicants will be interviewed on Thursday 28 January 2010 at King Athelstan Primary School
First meeting with settings will be on 5 February 2010 at King Athelstan Primary School
Placements will run from February – June 2010.  Artists will work in settings for the equivalent of 10 days and will be involved in professional development and reflection for the equivalent of 2 days.  All participants will have access to and the support of a mentor.

Applications
Send a CV, images of work and a statement of your interest in this project to:

Penny Hay, Director of Research
5×5x5=creativity
PO Box 3236
Chippenham  SN15 9DE
penny@5×5x5creativity.org

Closing date: 31 December 2009

For a full description please download from our website: www.5×5x5creativity.org.uk

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09/12/2009 by James.

I went in to the studio today to have a bit of a blitz… to clear out old images on the walls and generally de-clutter. I wanted to clear the space and clear my mind and to focus on what’s really important in my work.

But that’s just the point, when I start to think about it I know what’s important to me in terms of my focus and my values, but its not all that easy to work out if/how that comes across to others.

I can know that my participatory work supports people to explore themselves and their environment creatively, because I’m there with them, I get the feedback and I can get involved in the evaluation. And I know that this work feeds me, that I learn about how people can use art to learn in creative and ‘joined-up’ ways.

BUT… when I make more individual work, how do I or any other artist for that matter, know what effect it has on anyone else, unless you are actually there with them?

I had an interesting conversation with one of my 5×5x5=creativity colleagues yesterday, about the relationship of participatory and individual practice. In some ways it worries me that my work on projects such as 5×5x5 is focused on the importance of the creative process, and yet the next day I might be in my studio making a wall-based piece for exhibition, that I will leave and walk away and never really know if it is having any positive impact.

And yet, I reassured myself today that its okay, because, as I wrote in my sketchbook…

the artwork acts as an indicator of the level of personal/environmental awareness, whilst the process of exploring that leads to and informs the creation of the artwork supports the development of such an integrated awareness of self & environment.

The artefact is the evidence of the process and of its effects on the perception of the individual (me).

The creation of the artwork also further supports a sensory exploration of the world in a more focused way, and (if made in the right way) can act as a conduit for the flow of life energy, through the senses, through the individual and into the artwork.

So, as I came to realise after clearing the clutter, and (s)crawling across a rolled out sheet of paper to get my ideas ‘out-there’, how the different areas of my practice link up and relate to each other…

I am researching culturally influenced perception  (its impact on our learning, our behaviour and the ecosystems on which we depend), and its relationship to more direct, individual, sensory engagement. My resulting work supports the development of greater understanding of the relationship between the two, and the gap between them.

I am breaking down the perceptual barriers to direct engagement with ‘the one’ and ‘the now’… my research and my explorations inform my own understanding, which in turn supports my work’s ability to engage with its audience.

In other words I don’t need to make someone feel anything or think anything specific. I just need to provide the audience of my work, whether object based or participatory, access to a place where they can engage with the stuff of the world, and the issues that I am interested in, and allow them to gain from that experience in whatever way they need to at that point in time, as part of their own learning journey.

…Phew!

(by the way, the scruffy dog at the top is Moshi, who often accompanies me on my adventures, and was patient enough to wait in my studio, so I thought I’d include her too.)

Since writing this post I came across the following article on twitter (via @dryearth) which looks at the experience of the artwork by the artist/ audience, and the context within which the work is created/experienced -

Situated Cognition, Dynamic Systems, and Art: On Artistic Creativity and Aesthetic Experience - Ingar Brinck

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01/12/2009 by James.

I was in Kingston yesterday for 5×5x5=creativity, talking with a group of heads, teachers, and early years practitioners about creative learning and the inclusion of boys.

Its a tricky path to follow, providing for the needs of boys, without putting them into a box, and reinforcing any stereotypical ways of seeing and working with them. I know I didn’t enjoy my time at a traditional boys school and didn’t respond to the emphasis on outdoor sports and the controlling  almost dictatorial approach followed by some of the teachers. But there is research to suggest that a lot of boys do learn best through a more active full-bodied approach, and greater access to the outdoors.

My take on things is that if statistically more boys are seen to be ‘failing’ or not achieving what’s expected of them, then we’re doing something wrong, and that we’re probably doing something wrong for all children, not just the boys, but maybe (statistically speaking) the girls are more able to cope with a tradition of top-down, crowd-control, teaching methods.

Are we planning experiences for boys that build on their interests and value their strengths as active learners and problem solvers, or are we simply expecting them to be compliant, passive recipients of new skills and knowledge?

Confident, capable and creative: supporting boys achievements - DCSF

Now to me you could swap the ‘boys’ to ‘children’ and it would be even more pertinent - the reason children ‘fail’ is because our education system fails them.

I’m not a teacher, I am an artist and a creative learning consultant. I have loads of respect for teachers and learn from them each time I work with them. I am excited by the way in which I can work in partnership with educators and children, we can learn from each other, and by allowing the child to take the lead, they can show us how to work with them, where to work with them, and what they need to succeed.

But the difficulty is how to support teachers to put into practice this kind of creative, child-initiated approach when they are given so many hoops to jump through and class sizes that seriously inhibit opportunities for 1 to 1 contact with and observation of, individual children.

If each and every child was given the opportunity to learn in a way which is relevant to their needs and interests, through valuing and working with their own innate creativity, and if every child was encouraged to explore their local environment through their bodies and imaginations, then how can anyone fail - and why would we even need to teach or learn in specific ways according to gender?

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25/11/2009 by James.

Its been a while since I got chance to get back on here and share what I’ve been up to.

First of all I went to the Brecon Beacons for a few days of space, air, and mountain views, a beautiful area just along the M4 and up a bit, gorgeous!

It was great to be amongst the last of the Autumn colour, to be out walking and watching Red Kites, and come to a log fire. Here’s a photograph I took of the reflections on the canal near where we were staying, this reflected view for me gives the woods a much deeper, darker, mysterious, almost primeval quality, like a fairytale wood of dreams and stories.

Since then I’ve been busy with the Stonehenge Young People’s Consultation Project again for English Heritage, and have set up a blog for the participants. As soon as that is made public I’ll be sure to put the details up on here.

So far I’ve worked Years 5, 7, and 10, looking at designing the interior of the new education space,  creating a booklet for Geography students on the changing visitor experience past and future, and developing ideas for new face-to-face tours and workshops for Travel and Tourism students.

So its been a case of taking time to explore the monument and its surrounding landscape as it is now and then using discussion, drawing, writing and other creative ways to help everyone share their ideas for the future visitor centre. Here’s a couple of before and after shots of the changes planned for the area immediately around the monument.

This last week I was staying and working up in Lancaster alongside children and staff at the University’s Pre-School Centre. We were using different media to encourage the children to explore and learn from their interaction with the outdoors, whilst supporting the staff to develop their own skills in facilitating child-initiated learning.

We used mark-making materials, clay, natural objects, and a variety of recycled objects to explore shape, pattern, space, height, letter, numbers, and whatever else the children were interested in.

And finally, for today at least, I’m off to Kingston on Monday to run a professional development session with the new 5×5x5=creativity research cluster there. Its aimed at Pre and Primary School educators and will focus on Creativity and Inclusion, concentrating on supporting boys to learn creatively, especially in the outdoors.

So its busy at the moment, which is great, and its all connected and all so relevant to my practice, which is even better!

All I need now is a little time to get back in the studio and make some new artwork…

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23/10/2009 by James.

At the moment I’m working on a range of different creative learning initiatives and as always, and pondering the links between them all.

Firstly I’m consulting with children and young people in creative ways for English Heritage, using site visits, writing, and making to develop interpretation and learning materials for visitors to Stonehenge.

Through my ongoing work with Salisbury Museum, we are running a session at a MLA event next, a seminar exploring child-centred learning and working with extended schools.

Additionally I’m waiting to hear whether I’ll be working with a Primary school with an outdoors focus for 5×5x5=-creativity next year, or a special school.

And to top this all off I am sharing my own learning through individual pieces of evaluation for art in education projects and professional development for early years practitioners, on the value of creative and child-led approaches to learning.

Now individually, all of this work is inspiring and challenging, but looked at together its the cross-sector links and the bigger picture that I find fascinating.

As extended schools services seek to connect schools with families and communities, and Museums look to work in more responsive ways with those families, and early years settings seek to build on the new EYFS and embed creative learning practices within them, I feel a lot more positive for the future.

To use an already over-used phrase, this kind of joined-up thinking - of valuing the individual child (and parent) whilst holding an awareness of the bigger picture of family and community - can only benefit our children as they learn and develop their own world-views. Children that learn in ways appropriate to their own needs and interests, within the context of their local environment (natural/cultural/social) develop in confidence, self-esteem, empathy, respect for difference, and with a greater awareness of their role within, and impact on that environment.

If we are to develop sustainable ways of being within our ecosystems and societies for the future, then for me the way that we learn is key.

We need to invest in and promote ways of learning that are creative (and recognise each of us as innately so) and which support each child to explore, reflect on, and re-interpret their natural and cultural heritage.

‘The potential for every child is stunted if the endpoint of learning is formulated in advance’                                                                                                                       Carlina Rinaldi

Children live through their sense. Sensory experiences link the child’s exterior world with their interior, hidden affective world… Individual children test themselves by interacting with their environment, activating their potential and reconstructing human culture.’                                                                                                                              Robin Moore

Images from Connect & Create Project with Salisbury Museum

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