This week was our final artist session! There are now only two more weeks of group work before the programme comes to an end. As you've probably guessed by the picture above, this week we were learning how to knit... No, only kidding! We were visited by Lorna Morrish of Lorna's Handwoven Tapestires, who taught us the delicate art of... well, hand weaving tapestries of course!

And let me tell you; it's a lot harder than it looks in the pictures below! We were learning only the very basics, on a very, very small frame and still we were left with homework at the end of the session. Lorna was kind enough to stay on for extra time and give advice and guidance, as well as show us the yet more complex art of weaving on a large frame. Lorna's passion for her craft was infectious and we all thoroughly enjoyed the workshop, doing our best to create something interesting using only lines and colours. It's funny how sometimes such strict limitations can unlock more creativity.

 

This week the group circled back to the first session we had, learning percussion with Jim King, and explored the concept of rhythm, movement and gesture in the visual arts. This led to some very expressive pieces and got everyone in the mood to create, see below for a sample. Then, as usual, we returned to personal works; we've amassed quite a collection of work now and are hoping to exhibit it somewhere other than online! So keep an eye on this blog, or our Facebook Page for news about that.

Next week is our final artist session, where we'll be learning to weave tapestries with Lorna Morrish.

This week we started with a litle exercise to get the creative juices flowing. It's a fun one you might like to try yourself: we partnered up and then each person thought of a word, partners tell each other their word and the task is to draw whatever image comes to mind when the two words are combined. So, If I say "Whiskey" and you say "Rabbit", then we each have to draw what comes to mind when we think about "Whiskey-Rabbit"! 

See if you can guess the words from the pictures below. Some of them are easier than others,  but the fun comes from seeing how different people's minds work.

 

For our third artist session we were treated to a pottery workshop with Moira Ferguson of Holy Loch Pottery. We were exploring the theme of masks, and the visage of The Geen Man fell in nicely with our environmental approach to these sesions. Moira got us from blocks of clay to recognizeable masks, decorated with natural motifs in no time at all.

After the pottery session, we went back to more personal, expressive works, with some people evolving earlier works and others creating something new. Click through to see a few pictures from the session.