Can you tell who’s who?

Mood Lamp Workshops part 2

If you missed out on the popular mood lamp workshops last time you have an opportunity to get involved again!

Here’s all the info to make sure you don’t miss out:

Stu, our Tinkerer In-Residence is facilitating some exciting workshops in the Manchester Art Gallery education suite on 14th and 15th Jan 2012.

You’ll be making your own mini mood lamp styled by YOU, using an old bike wheel and powered using your old phone charger.

Be ready to take some paper, wire, LED’s and electronics to turn your useless old phone charger into a lamp.

You will need to come with an old mobile phone charger. If you haven’t got one don’t worry, we’ll have a few lying around.

There is no upper age limit so all those of you who want to experiment in electronics and art using recycled materials come and have a go!

For younger visitors: grown ups will be needed to help with snipping and stripping wires. No soldering is involved but you may need to use some pliers and cutters. You’ll also need your maths head on to do some voltage calculations, but don’t worry – Stuart will be on hand to help with it all.

Safety: there is no soldering involved in this workshop but there may be sharp things in use. Recommended age for this session is 8 years and older. All age recommendations are guidances; you may bring younger children, but you might find that they need more help or are unable to do some parts for themselves.

If you’re interested in joining us, just drop in on either 14th or 15th January at Manchester Art Gallery – you’ll find us in the atrium.

Last Saturday we held another YAD meeting. This time we were off programme and used the time to have a Christmassy get together. The day was extremely relaxed and took place at Full Circle Arts offices, this meant we were able to take advantage of the space, create break out areas for Research, Social Media, Blogging and Arts Award.

It was a chance for us to meet before the Christmas break, catch up with parts of the programme that required some attention and for the group to deliver a ten minute presentation.

People were provided with a space to revisit their blogs, update them, learn more about twitter and it’s uses, research training and development opportunities, feedback on work they have done outside of the sessions and continue with peer support and sharing of work.

In today’s post we bring you Monique Jarrett’s presentation:

Why I am on the Full Circle Arts YAD Programme

• I wasn’t sure exactly what I wanted to do

• I wasn’t sure how to move forward after my studies

• Did not know how to push myself

• Was of being the only one not knowing what I wanted

• Wanted to set goals and achieve something I loved doing and proud of

Through Monique’s presentation she discussed how she felt she was at a turning point, had a strong interest in the arts but wasn’t sure what direction she wanted to take. Monique felt that one to one Professional Development sessions really supported her to consider where she was and the area she wanted to progress in.

Monique highlighted, she has not only identified specific goals but has also moved forward in achieving what she wanted to do.

Working with a group of peers from a variety of creative practices who all wanted to pursue the arts at various levels has been encouraging. Monique felt they could all share and learn from one another whether their reasons for being on the programme was to learn more about the arts and participate in further arts activity, concentrate on their education and training or to support their career development. They were all there to progress in the arts and creative industry.

“Networking is a great tool to Promote yourself”

From the first session at Blank Media Collective, there was a discussion about how we as artists could make use of social media as the best way of promoting ourselves. From that I started using Facebook business page, set up a Blog and promote both through Twitter.

My WordPress blog for my jewellery in which I show some of my latest pieces and events I have been doing.

This is my Facebook business page in which I show my latest pieces and have links to my website.

Twitter: This is Where I promote my FB, Blog and Website, it is so quick and easy and reaches so many people in seconds. For me it’s free advertisement to the world and perfect for any business.

Monique felt it was important to mention how she has learnt how to use all these platforms together and has a real purpose for their use, they are a work in progress and time has allowed easier management. She finds all of them serve a purpose, however she finds the most traffic to her website is currently through Facebook.

One Blog session leads to another

After our Blogging session hosted by Blank Media Collective at Blankspace, facilitated by Fat Roland ( winner of Manchester Blog Awards 2010) I wanted to continue giving consideration to my blog. I wanted to know more and know exactly how to create my blog, as I had a wordpress site and our session explored Blogger I knew I needed follow up. I am also in a media group with the Cornerhouse, so I attended another session on Blogging where they helped me work out WordPress and later attended another session at Cornerhouse where they spoke about the best platforms to use for certain content.

I have found that having a blog is so much more useful to promote my pieces, quick and easy to upload photos and text and still looks professional.

Through all of these sessions I have managed to create and improve my blog.

How Session 3 of FCA YAD helped me with an up and coming event.

In month three we had a session based on Professional Development and Idea generation, facilitated by Rivca Rubin.

Which introduced us to different thinking techniques that can be used to help visualise our future goals, plan for work and generate ideas.

From this session I took away a physical exercise task based on Compelling Futures, we were asked to visualise a place in the future where we wanted to be, or something we wanted to achieve. Previous to this I had been asked if I would consider doing a mini stall at an event and I wasn’t going to go through with it as I didn’t feel like I had the confidence within myself. From visualising me successfully running a stall at the event and taking myself to that place I was able to run the stall at the conference, it was a huge success!

Creating an Artist Statement made things clear

In session five we had to create an artist statement, which is a description of what you have done and are doing as an artist or creative practitioner, promoting yourself to your audience in a formal and clear way. Having to write out whilst getting a lot of help from John at Blank Media to make my statement sound as appealing as possible, it made everything much clearer in terms of what I was working on and towards. It most of all gave me confidence in myself and my work.

Critique is just what I needed

In session six based on Critique I really needed to get some feedback on my pieces, my website and my blog. I have wanted feedback both good and bad but had never really received any, so when I got feedback on my blog and website I was so thankful. Taking on bored all the comments I received I have now changed many things on my blog and some changes to my website.

How I have used the individual training and development budget so far

From the funding that is available for us to access external training, development pr workshop activity that will support our arts development and expand our skills, I did some research into a variety of jewellery making classes and course and recently I was able to take part in two workshops. I enjoyed them so much. The first class was for a beginners class in Beading and I took part in this class to perfect my skill and technique. The second was on Vintage Stamps which is hammering metal stamp letters and using other tools on vintage brass to make pendants.

I was a little sceptical about the first class as even though I had only learned and mastered the basics in jewellery making through youtube videos, books and jewellery making channels, I wasn’t sure I would learn much more so entered the class to perfect what I already knew. However during the class I learned so much more, such as tricks of the trade and quicker more professional ways of making the jewellery which means I can now make more pieces in a shorter space of time for selling.

The Vintage Stamping class was completely new to me and after this class I am wanting to sign up for as many as possible to gain even more skills. After making pieces of my own design in class I published photos of them on my facebook business page. I received requests for these pieces within an hour.

Monique added she had really benefited from working with others who had an interest in her field, was introduced to new materials, tools and techniques. Once she has invested in some new tools she will be able to create new pieces and reach the demand for this product.

Monique completed her presentation by showing the group some of her new pieces of work. Again she received much positive feedback about her product and the updates she has recently made on her Blog site.

Blog. http://www.jadiorable.wordpress.com

Twitter. @roidmj

FB page.http://www.facebook.com/jadiorable

We will continue to post info about our sessions here and on twitter.

You are welcome to join us. Professional artists and organisations may have some links, info, opportunities and advice to pass on to the group; other young emerging practitioners are welcome to join the conversation here. Follow @full_circle_art    #fcaYAD

If you have any questions regarding our Young Artist Development Programme please contact

vicki@fullcirclearts.co.uk
@vickimccorkell

Note: Vicki McCorkell is no longer a permanent member of staff at Full Circle Arts. Vicki will be working freelance to manage the Young Artist Development Programme until August 2012.  If your enquiry is regarding the Young Artist Development Programme Vicki will reply to you during her working days of Tuesdays and Wednesdays. If your enquiry is regarding anything else, please get in touch with Full Circle Arts. info@fullcirclearts.co.uk

‘A twelve month arts development opportunity for 18 to 30 year olds who want to progress in further arts participation, training, education and a career in the arts”

Session 7 – Saturday November 12^th

We met once again last Saturday at the Zion Arts Centre. This session marked a clear half way stage to our programme; as we move comfortably into the second half of the Young Artist Development Programme it was vital to take a look back as well as return to blogging, arts awards and offer a time slot for Lucy Jackson to facilitate. There was a lot to do.

Time wasn’t on our side, but we started the thinking process and began to collect lots of stories of learning; reflecting on sessions, training, professional development planning, arts award and mentoring……

We will continue to map where we are now over the next few weeks and bring you up to date with this particular session, expect to be informed about our learning, activity, what next and a blog from Lucy Jackson.

So pop back soon.

We will continue to post info about our sessions here and on twitter.

You are welcome to join us. Professional artists and organisations may have some links, info, opportunities and advice to pass on to the group; other young emerging practitioners are welcome to join the conversation here. Follow @full_circle_art    #fcaYAD

On 20^th October, I (Mari) attended an Un-Conference hosted by Arts for Health. The Un-Conference – so named because it was a free, drop-in event – was divided into four sessions covering different aspects of using the arts to improve health and wellbeing. The topics were as follows:

- Changing Mindsets: the realities of artists engagement for mental health and wellbeing

- Understanding and Evidencing Transformative Practice

- Depression and Imagination

- Cultural Attendance and Public Mental Health

I attended the last two sessions.

Depression & Imagination was led by psychologist Dorothy Rowe, who talked us through her work and shared some of her opinions on the subject of how depression can affect imagination. She began by suggesting that “there is no such thing as Depression”, though there are people who are depressed, saying that it is not particular things that trouble us, but how we interpret these things that can trouble our minds. She went onto explain that practically everything around us is down to our own interpretation of the world, putting Reality itself into question by suggesting that our brains create a picture constructed from guesses based on previous experience, hence Reality is a mere figment of our imagination and everybody has a different Reality.

Art and artists thrive only because of this. If everyone saw the world in the same way, there would be no need to represent it. Art exists, according to Dorothy, because we each have our own way of seeing things and we are trying to convey what it is we see/experience and to share our personal Reality with others.

So how does depression relate to creativity?

Dorothy believes that what artists and people suffering depression have in common is sensitivity. People who are depressed are typically sensitive to what is going on around them and what other people think of them. This sensitivity, she claims, can be (mistakenly) interpreted as creativity – for what are artists if not sensitive to the world around them? There is a common belief that sensitivity and creativity emerge from the same source. Dorothy backed up this claim by citing Sylvia Plath and Virginia Woolf as examples of writers who actively held on to their depression because they believed their depression aided their creativity and that to combat their illness would be to suppress their creative flow. This is something I can sympathise with, as I find I am at my most creative when I am feeling sad. Like Brian from Channel 4 TV show Spaced, I am at my most creatively productive point when I am feeling a bit down, painting or writing to express myself and to get my negative thoughts onto paper and out of my mind.

This, then, is perhaps why art is considered to have therapeutic value and why schemes like Arts on Prescription are gaining reputation and support. Art therapy and community arts have, indeed, taken off in recent years, with everyone from small-scale arts organisations and charitable organisations to the largest national museums and galleries offering community arts as part of its services. How much of this is down to a genuine belief that art canand does help people and how much is down to a necessity to tick the funders’ boxes is anyone’s guess, but I do personally believe that igniting the spark of creativity does provide a flicker of hope for some people.

The following session on Cultural Attendance and Public Mental Health, led by Mark O’Neill of Glasgow Life and Leisa Gray of Manchester Art Gallery, seems to agree with the notion that culture and creativity can improve people’s states of mind. In his presentation, Mark outline three degrees of engagement for arts/cultural participation: art therapy, art activities and general attendance at universal services.

Leisa talked to us about the work she did with the young oncology unit at The Christie, where young cancer patients are receiving treatment. Leisa visited the hospital on a number of occasions and took with her some objects from the Mary Greg collection at Manchester Art Gallery. She told us how handling objects seemed to capture the patients’ and their parents’ imagination and opened them up to talk. Leisa believes that objects have the power to stimulate conversation and can encourage people to talk about memories, feelings and experiences without necessarily giving too much of yourself away. Object handling can take the focus off the speaker and allows the participant to make their stories as personal or as impersonal as they like, displacing feelings onto inanimate object or using the object as a way to trigger their imagination.

Whilst Leisa’s work with The Christie is a valuable example of how arts participation can help vulnerable groups, Mark points out that not everyone wants to or is able to actively participate in cultural activities. He suggests, however, that a simple activity such as going to the cinema can be equally beneficial to public mental health as Leisa’s more hands on approach. According to a longitudinal study carried out in Sweden, “analysis of the data revealed that attending the cinema, concerts or visits to museums and art exhibitions influences mortality in a positive direction…” (Boinkum B Konlaan, Lars O Bygren and Sven-Erik Johansson, ‘Visiting the cinema, concerts, museums or art exhibitions as determinant of survival: a Swedish fourteen-year cohort follow up’, Scandinavian Journal of Public Health 28, 2000). So there we have it, being culturally involved makes you live longer! This study, amongst others, provides evidence of measurable improvements in health and wellbeing for those who attend cultural events. Mark’s view is that the pathway to wellbeing is not what we do but how often we do it – like physical exercise, it doesn’t matter whether we go swimming or jogging, whether we read a book or go to a museum, what matters is that we do it regularly. Mark’s question now is how arts/cultural and health organisations should harness this apparent human need for cultural involvement and how to encourage the public to take regular mental exercise and include culture into their five-a-day.

The two sessions I attended led onto stimulating discussion with the arts, cultural and health professionals present on the day, but we’d like to continue this discussion on the digital sphere and hear your opinions too. Comments not only welcome but positively encouraged – it’ll make you live longer!

Presentations, pictures and attendance lists from the Un-Conference are now available via the Greater Manchester Arts Health website: http://www.greatermanchesterartshealth.org.uk/index/gmahn_events.php

To read Clive Parkinsons Arts for Health blog please go to http://artsforhealthmmu.blogspot.com/

If you read down you will see a post relating to the conference and feedback received entitled “Brief thoughts on the Un-Conference.”

***

On a related subject, Nexus Art Café is currently welcoming submissions for an exhibition exploring the relationship between art and wellbeing. More info on their website:

http://nexusartcafe.com/2011/11/on-bread-alone/

Over the next few months we will be doing our bit to promote those on the Young Artist Development Programme – please see previous blog posts for further information about the project including the latest write up about the most recent workshop.

Genevieve Pritchard

Genevieve Pritchard has an interest in working in whatever medium suits the idea best!

A lot of her work comes from trying to build her understanding of the world and human behaviour and making others think about the world around them, particularly from humour and lateral thinking.

Genevieve also likes exploring the history and properties of different mediums and how they affect the audience and content of work.

A driving statement behind a lot of Genevieve’s work comes from one of her favorite artists Barbara Hepworth, “ What one wants to say is formed in ones childhood and we spend the rest of our lives trying to say it”

Genevieve has recently been working on Ars, a new arts programme for allfm featuring poems, monologues, sketches, short plays, sound art and interviews with writers, performers, artists and people from the creative world. 

Participants made their own mini mood lamp styled by themselves using an old bike wheel and powered using an old phone charger.

They then took some paper, wire, LED’s and electronics and turned a useless old phone charger into a lamp.

There was no upper age limit so anyone who wanted to experiment in electronics and art using recycled materials came along and gave it a go!

Check out some wonderful photos from the weekend on Flickr:

http://flic.kr/s/aHsjwFSBuy 

We had a brilliant day. Everybody left very happy with a fully functional mood lamp for their bed side table.

Don’t worry, you haven’t missed out – you can catch us again tomorrow (23rd Oct) at Manchester Art Gallery between 10.30 – 4pm.

Chris using the old bike wheel to create the shade for her mood lamp

Participants using old phone chargers to power their mood lamps.

The bike wheel in action

Some of the finished lamps

A very pleased participant.