CAS Bureau of Exchange 2015

More information can be read here  www.chapelartsstudios.co.uk/projects/shop

Toyscape 2015

As part of CAS project Bureau of Exchange (2015) pupils from a local primary school took part in a series of workshops I was running. The workshops comprised of building sculptures, using broken toys and modroc. The pupils worked with CAS artist, Isaac Whitcombe, who took residency at the school for six months. They learned about Gainsborough's painting, entitled, 'Mr and Mrs Andrews' (1750) and discussed different aspects, including the concept of 'landscape'. In the workshop I introduced the idea that toys are changing with the advance of digital technology. I asked what will happen to today's toys in twenty years time, will they be forgotten? This led to the idea of building a 'Toyscape'. The children arranged the toys in various compositions; wrapped the structure in cling-film, then built layers of modroc.      

Yonat Nitzan-Green is a Bronze and Silver Arts Award Adviser

Painting and drawing workshops during the summer holiday for individuals and groups.

All ages and abilities welcome. 

For more details please contact Yonat at:
yonatnitzangreen@btinternet.com  
**** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** ****

"Yonat has a very calm approachable manner which immediately breaks down barriers and allows children to explore their own artistic skills in a way which builds confidence in their abilities and develops an enquiring mind...I can recommend her without reservation to work with small groups or whole classes of children. The work at Weston Park has had a long term impact on the children and the teachers, too, developed greater confidence as a result of her input."

From a Reference Letter written by Janet Aughey, Creative Agent with Creative Partnerships

Art lessons for home educating families

will start again in September 2012

Group One - Age: 8 – 11

Group Two - Age: 5 - 7

Place, day and time: Have yet to be decided

Price: £10 per child. Discount is available for families with more than one child.

The lessons are planned to suit the participants’ needs, age and abilities.

Brief for Group One:  The aims are to introduce basic art skills and concepts; to nurture the participants’ own creativity and love of making art works; to develop critical thinking.

Skills include: research skills, drawing from observation, getting to know different materials such as ink, charcoal and paint, working with digital cameras, Power-Point presentation and Photoshop.

Concepts include: perspective, line, surface, texture and composition.

Art concepts and artworks will be discussed in the contexts of art history and contemporary art. This will enable to develop a deeper understanding of art.  Lessons will also include visits to art galleries.


Brief for Group Two: The aim is to develop creative thinking by nurturing the imagination.  

Method: Learning through free making. Children will be free to follow their own ideas. Technical help will be given. Children will be encouraged to talk about their artworks.        

Contact details: m. 07709238966 Email yonatnitzangreen@btinternet.com

I’ve been teaching art as part of informal education for the past 30 years both in Israel and England. During this time I have accumulated a large body of experience and knowledge. I recognise that it is now the time to articulate this ‘body of experience’ in words.

Mutual relationships

Just as I taught others (both adults and children), others taught me. I always saw, and still see, teaching as a two way system where each of us is both a teacher and a student.

What art is not?

It is not techniques.

It is not copying.

It is not a formula.

It does not answer the question: How to...?

(How to paint a dog? How to draw a Robin?)

Yet...

The maternal position witness-participant

The maternal position witness-participant allows you to see change as it unfolds before you, where seeing is understood as a complex action comprises of reflection, meditation and participation.

You need to know many techniques. How many? As many as you find and invent. You can learn about a technique from a book. In your studio you can find and invent techniques by experimenting with different materials and recording those experiments. Sometime these explorations can be frustrating. However, if you allow yourself to go back to the space of your childhood; where you are an explorer and every experiment leads to a new finding; when it is still o.k. to play; then this activity leads to a whole world of creativity, far beyond the realm of a mere technique.

Motherhood can be a highly creative way of living. You practically invent your way, manoeuvring between stereotypical thinking which society around you try to impose on you, and your own conditioning, i.e. – how you should or shouldn’t behave.

Learning to draw from observation is not copying, but making a synthesis between your perception, drawing ability and an object. It is a skill that can be taught and develop. The more you practice, the more you realise that the actual nature of seeing is very complex.

‘The relation between what we see and what we know is never settled’, John Berger Ways of Seeing (2008).  

Within this unsettled sphere I reinvent myself every time I draw.

Witnessing and participating in change are interactions with time as a creative process.

Although art is not a formula, there are many methods that can be helpful in building your art work. For example, one method which I find very useful is keeping a sketch-book where I draw regularly. This sketchbook is a place to collect and record small, spontaneous thoughts in a form of drawings. Parallel to it are larger drawings which I make over a long period of time. I use the small sketchbook as storage of ideas, thoughts, marks, connections between one idea and another in visual language. However a sketchbook is more than a storage since it is a space in which time is considered as part of the artwork.