each time we clean and curate the beach, children find something that they want to take home. children still haven't unlearned to value and be curious, they instinctively know that trash can be treasure. apart from the instrinsic value like colour /texture /material of each object there is also a poetic value, a story hidden within each object. we want to find that story: let's be true detectives!
we draw the object in its original size: outline in pencil first, then colouring in with colour pencils. sharpen those pencils and look closely! by doing so we are practicing observation skills as well as three dimensional and life drawing. these school children are just 7 years old and doing an amazing job: without instruction they start drawing the object from all sides, indlucing top, bottom and side view. each view reveals different details!
like an archeologist we make a list with the following facts: date found, site found, material, colour and object characteristics. then we add these assumptions: provenance and age of object. with some luck this information is even revealed to us. look at this broken piece of porcellain: it has the inscription 'made in china'. with this information at hand, we start to imagine the life story of this trash/treasure, using basic questions like: who did this object belong to? how was the object used? why and where was it lost? how did it end up on tong fok pebble beach? i asked the children to use either themselves or a family member as protagonist to make the stories realistic and as close to their lives as possible.
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| please double-click image to enlarge |
above are some of the stories the children came up with. a wonderful way to get us thinking about our consumerist habits and their impact on nature and about life cycles of products.
next time you go to the beach and find some trah/treasure pick it up and think about its story ... if you come up with a story or a poem or an inspiration of any kind please send it to me:)
