When I was in High School I was interested in all things mystical. I picked up a book on Creative Visualization. It had a bunch of rituals you could engage in to manifest what you wanted. I tried one, it had a rather uncanny effect, one that ultimately had some negative consequences. That scared me off the practice. Unconsciously using ritual is not how we should be using our creative gifts.
Visualizing is the preliminary step before engaging in any creative endeavor. I have to first have the vision of what I would like to create, and then move into the action space to make that vision come into reality. So there is no magic here, it is a natural process of envisioning what I would like to see in my life. It is me connecting to my heart's desire and seeing what comes into view. We have unofficially been closed up at the Art Garage since July. We moved our operations into the park and then into the Community House, where we now have daily activities Monday through Friday. The Art Garage is sitting waiting to come back to life. It has been quite a year. So filled with newness. Everything that is coming into focus is the product of what is being drawn out from the desires and interests of those involved. One thing that I can see, is that we have some who take art seriously. I love it! So, I want to make the Art Garage live up to its name. My vision is to have a fully functioning studio. It will shift away from the crafts and science projects, slime and baking soda rockets, and become more of a serious studio. We will keep our science supplies and let them be used at the Community House. Maybe we will start to have STEM activities there one day a week. First things first. Time to clear out the old, let go of the past, and make way for the new. What will 2022 bring. I can't wait to see.
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Starting Wednesday August 11th, we will host Art in the Park at our local park: Columbia Park - 307 McClure Ave. It is right next to the McClure library branch. Come join us Wednesday 2-4PM and Friday 3-5PM. Math Games,
Slime, Face Painting, Kindness challenges, and lots of fun!!! As we enter into August, we start our next theme. Temperance. What exactly is temperance? It is a bit of an abstract concept. It includes humility, moderation, self-control and interestingly forgiveness. Personally, from that list I know that humility is one I am always seeing. Humility is an accurate perception of things. I am not the greatest in the world, nor am I the worst. I can see things through a realistic viewpoint. The foundation for a good life according to Buddhism's 8 fold path. Where step one is Accurate Perception.
Still, forgiveness (or rather unforgiveness) is a relatable issue all over today. And children can understand this well as they quickly notice injustices all around them. Also, forgiveness follows easily after our month of discussion justice. Can we learn to forgive? How do we hurt ourselves when we don't forgive? What can we do to help repair a relationship that has been hurt or damaged because of anger and an unwillingness to forgive. Today we will write letter of forgiveness. We will share them in the community and invite others to do the same. We invite you to join us too. Get out your old stationary, and write an old-fashioned letter to someone you love, but have been keeping out of your life because of unforgiveness. The topic of justice is one that can be particularly relevant to our community. As I was considering what to present for our session, I heard a radio show about a young teenager, only 13 years old at the time of his conviction, who spent 18 years in solitary confinement. Ian Manuel was just a kid when he was locked up, with the intention that they would throw away the key. His story is not one of heartbreak, though, it is one of redemption and the power of the human mind and imagination. He describes how while he was in prison he was able to imagine what his life would be like when he was released. He imagined bringing awareness regarding the cruelty in the prison system. Ian was released on 11/11/16 and now dedicates his life to bringing awareness and justice for prisoners. He also writes powerful poetry. For this week's Art Garage we asked the kids to watch and reflect on the poem Uncried Tears. You can hear Ian share this poem on CNN here. We then asked them to write a poem or paint a picture that reflected their thoughts about what they had seen. Our kids are pretty deep thinkers, for the most part. They have seen a lot more at their young ages than most adults see in a lifetime. But they are also just kids, and have the sweet, gentle, open-hearts as kids should. So when one of our new Kindness Ambassadors asked if she could write a song that was not about the poem, of course the answer was yes. Her song was so filled with joy, that I simply can't stop singing it. Please check it out, and share the joy of family, happiness, and your favorite ice cream! https://drive.google.com/file/d/119MaMkQ1FsKj2qTj-rk01t3WLLRhYmDn/view?usp=sharing The Community House Art Garage is working to create a better world through creative expressions of peace. We are Ambassadors of Kindness, hoping to spread more goodness into the world. Each month we follow a theme based on the universal strengths and positive character traits of ALL human beings. These were discovered through a cross cultural, world-wide study looking at the best of human beings. The researchers found 6 core themes. This month we are celebrating Justice, and so we welcomed in another Ambassador of Kindness, Chief Demario Boone. He himself is organizing positive, safe community events for Peoria youth in his Lights On Peoria program. It is easy to get caught up in our differences, and find ways to create division and separate us from one another. The strength in our community and in our world come from us seeing our shared goals and values and working to bring those into the forefront of our lives. When we work together for good, we can change the world! Join us at the Community House Art Garage to have fun, and connect to your neighbors! The Core Domains of Virtues 1. Wisdom and Knowledge: creativity, curiosity, open-mindedness, love of learning, perspective, innovation 2. Courage: bravery, persistence, integrity, vitality, zest 3. Humanity: love, kindness, social intelligence 4. Justice: citizenship, fairness, leadership 5. Temperance: forgiveness and mercy, humility, prudence, self-control 6. Transcendence: appreciation of beauty and excellence, gratitude, hope, humor, spirituality Having Kelly and Keegan's Krew join us at the Art Garage has really given us the chance to work on connecting to another purpose in our art and activities, that of building more positive emotions and character in ourselves. Keegan's Krew is all about being Kind, and so we at the Art Garage and Center for Creative Learning have created a new focus on being an Ambassador for Kindness in our community. The Community House and the Art Garage base their programming on building character and self-awareness. We particularly like the Virtues Project. So we have started our path to creating a whole community of Ambassadors of Kindness. It is a wonderful sight to see, as we start to recognize the good in each other and realize that it is only through bringing more goodness into our own lives that we can spread this goodness throughout our community and the world. This Wednesday the Art Garage will be hosted at the Community House as we celebrate the completion of 381 days of peaceful demonstration by Gabe Trevino. Check it out on our Events Page. And remember, Always Be Kind. Memorial Day weekend was filled with activity. We hosted our Art Garage at the Community House and then continued to paint, tie-dye and play for the next two days. We had planned on painting a mural on our Friday afternoon session, but it was a dreary rainy afternoon. So instead we pivoted in place and the mural was painted on Sunday after we had completed our now FIVE garden boxes. I know a big part of creating together is for each artist to see what he or she is capable of creating. It feels good to look at a finished project and say, "I created that." Taking pride in our work is important. Today, we live in such a fast paced, and often throw away culture. I see the kids in school do a project for class, get their grade and then throw their work in the garbage. Is that the value we want to instill? What about pride in our work and our workmanship. Seeing our work in front of us, and showing it to the world is more reflective of how we can live and participate in life in a meaningful way. So, I especially like that our latest painting project is so visible. A mural on the side of our Shop Co-Op that draws attention to our community garden. The finished product is beautiful, and more important it is a reminder to all those who participated that they are an important member of our neighborhood. It is meaningful to feel a part of a neighborhood, and there is not better way to feel a part of, than to see yourself in the space around you. I love that the Art Garage community is embracing the Community House as a space of their own. Next up- The Shop Co-OP! The good news is that I believe we have found a perfect connection in Jason Pickles, founder of the handyman service "Everything Under the Roof". He has some incredible connections to our community, and was one of the co-founders of the non-profit Neighborhood Heroes! What an incredible synchronicity it was meeting him in the East Peoria Thornton's! The universe does indeed work in mysterious ways. I miss sharing all the photos of the happenings at the Art Garage. This past year of masks and hiding our faces has been hard. I can't imagine what it is doing to the brains of our little one. The neuroscience has shown us the importance of facial expressions in emotional development. What a strange social experiment we have been engaged in this past year.
One thing I about art is that it has a powerfully beneficial effects on our emotions. So I am grateful that I have the opportunity to participate in helping these kids through this rough period, but holding this space for them to have a bit of fun and socialize. The truth is, I got into this business of community organizing in a rather round-about way. I came to Peoria to work with the school district. District 150 struggles with the very common problems that poverty brings, and my background in studying emotional and attention networks in the brain has given me a perspective that changes the lens of how we educate. How can we create healthy brains? Basically, the approach is the same as most progressive and holistic models. I also studied drugs of abuse and have worked with at risk populations, and have some new approaches for teaching to these populations. I thought the Peoria schools were a perfect fit. I have shared previously how my efforts were in vain. But, I am not one to give up, and although the project changed, the goals remained the same--to create experiences that would lead to healthy emotional and attention brain systems for our kiddos! Art has the power to do both. The attentional focus of engaging in art comes from within. The act of creating takes persistent effort, and embodied awareness. The hands on element is important in building the foundation of our attention systems. So much of what kids do today is on the computer. To build the foundational attention networks in the brain we have to move out of doing everything in a virtual space (i.e. screens and computers) and into the physical world. Besides building attention and motivation, art has a positive effect on our emotional networks on many levels. Art is calming. It activates the default mode network in the brain and can lower cortisol levels. Art is also incredibly fun. Positive emotions, and laughter, release neuropeptides that enhance our physical and psychological well-being. So maybe I don't have a lot of photos of kids, and my blog-posts have been minimal, but this springtime has been filled with great fun, lots of hands on activities and lots of laughter! Our chickens are getting big too! I am a bit overwhelmed with the opening this year. I have a lot more moving parts than in years past.
Just to name a few. 1. I am teaching my final class at ISU, thank goodness. The graduate students seem to think I am crazy when I tell them I don't do rubrics, I don't give grades, and they are supposed to develop a vision, and collaborate with their peers (and myself) before creating a final paper. These things make them crazy, and they tend to lash out at me stating that I am not doing it right. Usually by this time of year they understand, but this year they are particularly stubborn. A lot of it may be the virtual environment, or perhaps how busy I am with other things, but I seemed to have lost my connection to many of them. 2. We have a full house at the Chrysalis Sober Living, which is fantastic, and I just love watching these ladies grow and come into a life they deserve. 3. We have five different 12 step meetings a week at the Community House, of which I chair four. Believe me, I do not want to be chairing all these meetings, but my helpers got full time jobs, which is wonderful for them and sucks for me. 4. We just finished our course on Strengthening Your Core, which was phenomenal and came just in time for me to process the letting go of my apparent failure of an academic career. I am grateful for that! 5. We have started the new workshop series "Already Leading" and the "If I Knew Then" lecture series. 6. We are planning on opening up for yoga! I need this one badly. 7 - 100. Too many things to list and even much more than that to do!!!! I am just taking it one moment at a time as they say in AA. On a fun note, I bought two baby chicks for the Art Garage Opening week! When I taught in the alternative school on the South Side of Chicago, I tried to bring activities that would awaken the softer side of our tougher students. By far my favorite activity was hatching baby chicks. Last year I couldn't resist a small chick I saw at the Farm and Fleet. On an impulse I bought her, and she lived with the guinea pig until we eventually built her a coop. The art garage kids loved Fluffy Cheeks and it was a great opportunity to be gentle with this fragile creature. This year, I decided to get two more chicks for the opening of the Art Garage. I let the kids name them. So Welcome to... Tyler Toby Michael Bob Titus, Jr. and Ruby Fluffy Princess The weather is beautiful and we have begun some new projects. I hope this year we will do more gardening, and a bit of carpentry thanks to the helpers at the Shop Co-op. There are so many possibilities. We will officially open on Tuesday March 30th and run activities through Easter. Each day, gardening activities will be held in the mornings from 10AM til 12noon. Art activities will run in the after noon from 3PM until 6PM each day. Art Garage Opening ScheduleTuesday March 30th - Plaster Masks
Wednesday March 31st - Flow Painting Thursday April 1st - Water colors and Water Fun (Weather Permitting) Friday April 2nd - Soap and Bath Bombs Saturday April 3rd - FIRST APPRENTICE AT THE SHOP CO-OP Sunday April 4th - EASTER PARTY |
Abigail LarrisonEducator, Scientist and Art Maker. The purpose of all life is to spread joy. What brings more joy than making art? Archives
November 2023
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