Stories of Departure at ArtPlay

A month ago the pianoBoat project ran a 5-day shadow-storytelling workshop intensive with thirteen 8-to-12-year-olds. The workshop and the show at the end was part of ArtPlay's dedicated year-round program of children's art activities at Birrarung Marr in the centre of Melbourne. It was an amazing experience working with a relatively small group of inspired young participants for 5 afternoons in a row. The significant amount of focus required of all involved, ended up creating a wonderful sense of camaraderie along the way to a surprisingly entertaining show for parents and friends.

Shadow-puppets are quite a tricky medium - not nearly as complex as marionettes, it's true, but nevertheless demanding a fair bit of abstract thinking and subtle hand-eye coordination. We were impressed by the fact that everyone got the hang of what was going on so quickly, each in their own way.

The premise 'Stories of Departure' was to create a story filled with characters journeying through a future where the climate had changed and technology had also moved with the times. We introduced the group to concepts of Biomimicry and encouraged them to think of the most imaginative ways in which the special qualities of animals and plants might be taken advantage of, literally or through scientific adaptations.

The drawing and writing games that started things off, successfully got everyone's creative brains in gear. The results of the collaborative writing and drawing games quickly got us all laughing too at the absurdity and hilarity of strange creatures and curious misinterpretations.

Having departed for a somewhat mutant future, the next task was to create characters, complete with names, homes, animal companions and other special attributes. The 13 brave imagineers tackled the assignment with a diverse and idiosyncratic array of approaches. Most clearly went with the known quantities of characters they'd drawn elsewhere, locating them in an adaptive future world. While we'd painted a mildly dystopian vision of times to come, the children were gently encouraged to use the powers of the imagination to devise more cheerful outcomes for the shadow-puppet people they were drawing.

After drawing came the exercises of determining where puppets would be articulated, and of tracing the component parts onto black card. A whole lot of fiddliness later, the puppets were taking shape and escorted back to the workshop in Brunswick for a strengthening coat of shellac. The reassembly required plenty of split-pins, fiddly linen-threaded-joints, tape, rods, and patience.

Once on rods the games could begin again in earnest, as the shiny new silhouette-characters were made to act out happy and sad moods set by the raucous accordion tunes. After that came more complex and nuanced emotions, and a whole bunch of improvising while running repairs were provided by the project leaders.

By Friday the character development had expanded to include the participants themselves as well as their new 2-dimensional friends. Inspired it seems by the conpsicuous mustache on the otherwise hairless head of pianoBoater Raku, almost the whole group ended up with handsome black paper mo's attached by masking tape. Meanwhile scenarios were being devised in 4 sub-groups, and practicing was underway on multiple screens. Each group was given their own section of an epic panoramic digital set, which itself was composed of various drawings with wild visions of biomimetic architecture and advanced urban agriculture rising over the clunky remnants of our modern era.

For more information on the excellent offerings at ArtPlay of fine arts and craft made specifically for, by, and with children, follow this link: www.melbourne.vic.gov.au/artplay. Keep an eye on ArtPlay's 2011 programs as they are published, which may well even include some further adventures with the pianoBoat project…