5 Objects in a Bag – A workshop with Headway Arts’ Creative Director Allie Walton-Robson in Skelefteå, Sweden.

Aims:

To begin:

• to develop and explore creative processes with 5 objects used as stimulus.
• to find ways of communicating and sharing ideas.
• intercultural dialogue through the project.
• break the ice and build trust within the project team.

Method:

I asked the group to sit on chairs in a circle –  a practical arrangement that we like to work in at Headway Arts. We can all see and hear each other, there is no end or beginning, no one is at the front or back, higher or lower. We are all at the same level physically and in equality.

Each country was asked to bring along 5 identical objects. We placed them ceremoniously in the centre of the circle. The objects looked beautiful. The UK brought 5 handmade bags.

I then invited a volunteer to begin the process of exploring the objects considering all five senses. I encouraged the volunteer to use whichever manner they preferred, maybe or maybe not using words but showing and sharing thoughts with the rest of group in some way. Happily, Fernando from Spain kindly volunteered to begin (a much appreciated thank you!) and so the group began the sensory process of exploring the objects and sharing the personal meanings they provoke.

I asked the rest of the group to observe carefully and respectfully, which they did. The volunteer was given as much time as they wanted for their sensory exploration and then were thanked for their ideas and asked to choose someone else in the circle to pass the object onto. This carried on until everyone in the group had joined in. Some people considered the object offered to them while others swapped it for another from the centre.

When it was Fran’s turn, she deliberately went outside the circle* to find another object (a glass) to illustrate that we must expect the unexpected in our work.

I deliberately asked people not to describe the objects that they had brought along. This allowed everyone to respond and make up their own minds about the objects without being influenced by prior knowledge. (Partners: You may like to add descriptions to this blog now so we can find out the actual stories behind those lovely things?)

In the workshop, people chose to use mainly non – verbal expression: gesture, movement, action, mime. I was very happy to see this naturally happen as it supported those within the group whose first language is not English. As a result, we began to find ways to communicate with each other in a very human way.

Ideally we should have had much more time to explore the objects properly. At the end of the workshop each country chose a bag and placed their objects inside. They then took these away to begin working with them in their own groups.

Evaluation

Q1: what are we learning?

At the end of the session I asked the group to identify what skills they thought they had been using:

Some of the responses were: imagination, discussion, team work, listening and answering, listening to information, communications, working through a process, creative thinking, giving and receiving, taking instructions.

Q2: What conditions need to be put in place for people to progress in their learning?

Some of my notes include:

• Time – when working with another group I would have had more time and would have slowed down the process.
• Records – usually I would have taken written notes of everyone’s ideas to remind me what everyone did to ensure that nothing was missed and could be returned to in a future session.
• Openness to questions – People felt more comfortable performing the task when they were able to check things with questions.

Q3: What can we do to help the learner recognise what they have learned?

Q4: How can we best apply what we are learning to our organisation?

Through sharing: I am sharing this document on the blog so it can be read by others and discussing it within the organisation particularly with others who could not attend the mobility. It will also be available online to external viewers.

What are the next steps?

The next step is to start a process of creating something new within our own organisations using the ‘bag’ as a stimulus.  These can be shown/shared and discussed at our next mobility in Ferrara.

We should look at how we can best organise and interpret the creative ideas that come from the process.

While we are involved in the creative process with our own learners, do keep looking back at the 4 evaluation questions above.

The story continues in Ferrara…good luck!