For the last couple of years, I have done a workshop with Yr 3s at my son’s primary school in preparation for art’s week which usually takes place the end of June. I often enjoy the opportunity because it gives me a chance to bring together some of what I’ve been learning myself, simplifying or getting to the heart of it and sharing it with an enthusiastic group of children (who are usually lovely and full of appreciation!)
This year I have been asked to work with Yr 6s which is great as my middle son is in that year and he will be leaving in July. The theme, as one might expect, is recycling. I know many people are working with plastic bottles and cardboard boxes and we have seen a lot of that over the last few months on social media. I also know other classes will be doing the same. However, as these kids are slightly older and getting ready for secondary school I feel confident we can do something a little more sophisticated – although I am aware I need to keep things as clear as possible.
Recycling images
I mentioned recycling images to my son who asked how that was relevant. So, here goes…
Topic
It doesn’t have to be shiny and new to be valuable
Part 1 – a whistle-stop tour through the history of the growth of images
- Start with connecting to the industrial revolution and the start of mass production. They have looked at the Victorian era and will be able to connect history they have already thought about. (Invention of cameras).
- Look at a few advertising images from the 50s/60s – discuss the ideal and how it entailed new shiny products, how people were suddenly inundated with images of new things they must have – https://www.telegraph.co.uk/goodlife/11888063/TV-adverts-of-the-Fifties-PG-Tips-to-Guinness.html or https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBiLvkso-Eg
- Look at the 80s and the explosion of advertising images
- Think about how many images there are today. Look at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-15756616
Split the class into groups and get them to do five to ten minutes of research on advertising images from a certain era, finding products (perhaps specific – washing machines, cars, soda streams). (Check this OK with teachers).
Perhaps end this section with one with one of Richard Prince advert images.
Part 2 – begin to think about using old images to make new work. “the ecology of images”
- Introduce Duchamp and R Mutt and Fountain – this will make them laugh, start with the idea of using stuff that already exists in the world rather than painting or drawing (or taking a new photograph)
- Look at a range of artists who use old images to make work – Hannah Höch, Kensuke Koike, Priya Kambli, Maud Sulter, Randal Plowman, Isabel Reitemeyer
- (and just as an introduction to his ideas, Joachim Schmid)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fountain_(Duchamp)
Maud Salter http://www.terheijne.net/hemera-collective-secret-agent/
Think about the notion of using old photographs that might be thought of as rubbish or something to throw away to make work with instead; to question the impulse to make new things all the time.
The following is highly sophisticated so I will need to simplify, but the concept should inform the work we make:
“Far from satisfying our need for information, the ungraspable abundance of indiscriminate data leaves us just as ignorant but much more confused. By reviving the Duchampian gesture, Schmidt cancels the value of production (taking pictures) and shifts it to selection, to the act of point and choosing.” We might use the children’s’ interpretation/translation of this statement as a cohesive statement.
Split the class into groups and guide them with the following discussion points, each group can tackle one or two items:
- How does the sort of work made by the above artists relate to recycling?
- How do we decide what’s valuable in our society?
- What are waste products and what should we do with them?
- Think about how people from the past dealt with their rubbish?
- Why do we have such a lot of waste in modern society?
- How can the sort of art we’ve been looking at make people think about their attitudes towards waste, how much stuff we make, the value of our stuff?
Part 3 – make montages using old images, wallpaper, hole punches, glue, scissors.
In groups, and influenced by one of the artists we have looked at (each group has a different artist), make a piece of work or several pieces of work in the style of the artist.
Children will be asked to bring in old photographs, magazines or newspapers.
I have some wallpaper sheets which I will ask each group to incorporate into their work so there is a cohesive look to all pieces.
Finally, I deliberately chose artists to really focus on who are NOT the usual famous ones, or only white, male, or western (apart from Duchamp but we might discuss the fact that his idea for the urinal may have come from elsewhere).
Artists to work with in groups
http://www.priyakambli.com/kitchen-gods.html
https://www.instagram.com/kensukekoike/
https://www.randelplowman.com/works/collage/the-secrete-soul-of-things/
I will need to be careful about showing some of these but I think the vegetable ones will appeal to 11-year-olds and really make them think about ‘art’: http://www.isabel-reitemeyer.com/2018-2/#10