Exploring the amazingly magical Iceland this week on the Children's Storytelling and Art Course, where an elf expert is consulted before routing a new road through rock piles that may be elf habitats, and trolls are everywhere in the landscape if you know where to look. Ghost Mazes by George and Caius, and poltergist … Continue reading Elves and Trolls
Children’s art
Chimeric Collages
Travelling back in time to Ancient Greece this week, the children of the Storytelling and Art course heard about the many chimeric creatures that inhabit the myths: Minotaur, Satyr, Harpy, Sphinx, and Chimera. Inspired, they created their own hybrid monsters, cutting up old magazines to produce these fantastic collages.
Windows on the World
In their passports, participants of the Storytelling and Art from Around the World course inserted a picture of themselves as a character of their choosing complete with name, magical attributes, and planet of origin. Using coloured acetates, windows were made to look in upon various characters created in response to folk stories. This week: … Continue reading Windows on the World
Story Mapping
The after-school story-telling and art sessions have evolved into the children writing their own story in weekly installments that I type up and read back to them the following week. They still listen to folk or creation tales from different cultures each week, and these tend to inspire elements of their own story. Week one, … Continue reading Story Mapping
Voices on the Wind
For the past five months, I've been a creative practitioner in a primary school, working with a storyteller to produce a record of the stories about the local area surrounding the school. We have covered a vast time period, from the Bronze age, right up to the mid-19th century. I have been using printmaking with … Continue reading Voices on the Wind
Natural Abstracts
Some stunning paintings made in response to two stories from Africa today on the Children's Art and Storytelling course that I am running at Llanover Hall Arts Centre. 'Why the Sun and Moon Live in the Sky' - a Nigerian folktale, and 'The Lion's Whisker' - an Ethiopian Folktale. Elements by Jim age 9 … Continue reading Natural Abstracts
This Is What I Would Turn Into At Night
Here are some of my favourite art works by children I have been working with over the past months. They have been responding to old folk stories from many cultures. The Lady of the Lake (Wales) Maui's Magic Fishing Hook (Maori) The Fox Maiden (Korea) Guardian Totems (Korea) Medusa (Greece) Gelert (Wales) Baba Yaga … Continue reading This Is What I Would Turn Into At Night
Visit to Cardiff Print Workshop
As part of my role as creative practitioner at Ton yr Ywen Primary school, I arranged for two groups of Y2 children to visit Cardiff Print Workshop as part of the Lead Creative Schools Project. As we have been using cyanotype printing to create banners and flags from drawings of the Welsh folk stories the … Continue reading Visit to Cardiff Print Workshop
Baba Yaga and Vasilisa the Brave
For the last week of this five week cycle of storytelling and art from around the world, we travelled to Russia to hear about the enigmatic Baba Yaga. She is a many-faceted figure, variously seen as a Moon, Death, Winter, Earth Goddess, totemic matriarchal ancestress, female initiator, or archetypal image.[4] After discussing some of Baba … Continue reading Baba Yaga and Vasilisa the Brave
Folktales from India
Children's Storytelling and Art Course, Week four. The children were interested in the concept of having two heads after hearing the Indian folktale about a bird with two heads that can't agree. They drew pictures of themselves with the head of something or someone they would or would not like to be attached to and … Continue reading Folktales from India
Sarah J Featherstone 