Monster workshop

This is me advertising the make a monster workshop - and a couple of the samples I made for it. And yes, the doll is not a monster, I know.

This month I have run a couple of workshops for young people. In one we made corsages, both fabric and leather ones. It was interesting that the leather ones were by far the most popular. There seemed to be a reluctance to sew among the girls. Some of them could sew, but most couldn't, and refused to try it out. I think this was mainly due to a confidence issue - they perceived it as something they couldn't do, so they wouldn't even try. It was a real shame, but a useful lesson for me in my expectations! These brooches have been really popular with other young people, but the dynamic in each group is different, and it only takes one objection to influence the rest of the group. The leather brooches involved cutting and glueing, rather than sewing and they all got on quietly and happily with this one. It probably is easier, and there was nothing in the process than they felt they couldn't do. Also I suppose leather is a more interesting material which they hadn't worked with before. I think I'll develop some more workshop ideas which use scrap leather as it goes down so well.
I want to make a piece for the end of project exhibition using leather - I was given some great silver leather scraps last week, which is really inspiring. I had a play around with some ideas last week and something is formulating.

I did a short session for 13-year old boys who were in the process of returning to school following exclusion. I was somewhat unsure how this would work, but it went really well! I printed lots of images onto heat transfer paper.










I used my own images of roof tiles, lichen, leaves, cotton reels and other details which were cut up to create abstract patterned designs. Despite my best efforts, all the boys wanted to put their own names on their t-shirts, rather than do anything abstract! However, the eco-style exhibition did manage to inspire them a little - this tv image is based on a Howies t-shirt print.










Next are two half-term workshops on 15th February at Bantock House, and 16th February at Bilston.