bags in progress

Kids told me that they want to make a bag for themselves as they need a bag to carry their things to school or otherwise. I was looking at different kinds of bags they can make like a bag with a belt or bag like folder. Then I thought it would be nicer if they have a bigger bag so they can carry their books as well in that bag. I thought it would be nice to use their old sketches from previous activities.
I chose the activities of finding "things in pairs" and "first thing they touched in the morning" that I had done with younger group, some of the kids had already done this activity so they started making their bags by taking the visual from this activity (they tool top and thread, radio) others quickly drew 5 ideas for things found in pairs, chose one that they like the most and started making bags (pairs like stove and gas cylinder, kite and spool, foot and slippers, scissors and fabric came out) they made bags in the shape of cylinder with stove attached, top, kite, water “matka”. They used only patchwork to stitch their bags. I told them to choose fabrics which are printed and embroidered and combine them together to make their bag. This will reduce their work of embroidering on it. They will just have to stitch patches together.

Printing

Now the activities were bringing out abastract art pieces from children. It was time to break the chain and bring in some new activities that would emerge visuals that are different from what we have been doing till now. It was also time to bring in a new technique to use to break the monotony. So I kept different objects in front of children and told them to choose one object and draw 5 sketches of the same sketch. Each successive sketch being simplified from the previous sketch. I introduced children to printing using rubber chappal. They carved one of the simplified sketch of the object and printed on a piece of fabric that they will use as a patch on a garment.

pretty clothes!

green top before embroidery

green top after embroidery (visualization from the song "chinna chinna aasai")

before

after

Some clothes and patchwork done by kids. Some more to come soon :)

fourth panel meeting

Mrs. Narayanan

-Tell children to choose another song and visualize it- get them to familiarize with design process and design thinking
-there is a difference when you are going to Swati’s class and I am going to Swati’s class and I will become textile designer, you are making these children designers or to be designers. Now they say we are going to Sadhvi’s workshop, let them say it’s for “us” “we are going for us.”
-Let them find value for themselves in it
-its its time to do hopes and fears for them, tell them to locate fear and it will be a feedback for you to plan more, designers need feedback constantly
-build the tool-kit in the process, tell children to make their books, write their reflections, their hopes, fears etc. and I should mention the point that Prayas said in Alisha’s review as well, DON’T THINK THAT YOUR PROJECT ENDS WITH THE END OF THIS PROJECTS SUBMISSION DATE.
-I don’t think you should include story in tool-kit book-its an artistic impression, it may get muddled up with tool-kit book, you may get jacked in jury-they may tell you to show level one and two of the tool kit book, you are working at level three now. If someone like sharda wants to use this tool-kit book she should be able to find value in it easily.
-could you take some graphic sense in embroidery because I think boys would want to wear something more graphic? And graphics asks for a lot of simplicity, that is another level of working.
-have you showed them some work by artists who have worked with contemporary embroidery?

Swati

-look at different aspects for tool-kit book for children as well as facilitators.
-let children write what they struggle with, their reflections etc.
-you have done iterations for the form of the book now make iterations of tool-kit book-rough iterations with little content then you would know which one to choose that is working-then may be you can take it to Sharda and other facilitators to give you feedback if you look at co-design, it says involve users as involving users help to improvise the product.
-you will also need to make your content crisp for the book
-I think tool-kit is your main product and garments you are achieving through the process of tool-kit book so focus on tool-kit book as well

"Chinna Chinna Aasai"- "Small small wishes"

"Chinna Chinna Aasai" is a Tamil song which means "small small wishes", it is a song in hindi also which goes "dil hai chota sa, choti si aasha"
Today was an exciting day for everyone, especially for kids. Today’s workshop involved listening to Tamil music which included sketching a part of the song. Each of the kids chose one line from the song, added one more of their line and visualized it. They started visualizing the lines on the clothes that we have collected for them, giving them clothes to embroider on made children more excited.

Children came up with beautiful wishes after listening to the song. Chandrakala chose a line from the song that said, I want to touch the stars, she added her own line saying “she wants to talk to the starts, because it is said, old people when die they become stars, so she can talk to her grandparents by talking to the stars”

Devika chose a line that said, “Throw away your sorrows” she added her own line that said, “and flow like a river, which is independent.

I discovered that some children are becoming stuck with certain ideas; they draw either rainbow or wings in every drawing. Now next task is to figure out the ways to break their ideas which are becoming set.

some visualization of the lines that children chose.

some clothes in progress.

REFLECTION | CHANGE | TRANSLATION

REFLECTIONCHANGETRANSLATION
[R]On Saturday, besides keeping the things very open, there were still limitations. Limitations in terms of visual vocabulary, lack of structure. After getting the feedback from children about why they felt uncomfortable/frustration to do visuals-it came out that children were not clear with what they were expected to do. They have very limited visual vocabulary so something was required to push up their visualization.

[C]Arzu suggested, I should give them some painting to refer to and let them select some works from textiles that they think relates to their work, then tell them to draw from the painting and a piece of textile they like. I chose a painting by Kandinsky, {which had various forms and it gave a feeling of patch work} and gave them few textile books to choose one piece of work from it. They will start seeing the transformation designs through textiles.

[T]Children chose paintings according to the emotions they had chosen on Saturday. By choosing the paintings and a piece of textile work helped them build their own ideas, it opened them to use lines in different ways, they thought about what color they want to use for which emotion.

There was a jump in learning for children. They moved up from the level they were on Saturday. I realized I was being too rigid with the idea of letting them have their visuals first, then let them start with embroidery. In a conversation with Arzu about letting them start even if their visual is not complete would be ok, let their needle be the tool to continue their visuals rather than limiting them to use colors to finish the visual.
Thank you Arzu :)

color circles with younger kids

Progression

The following visuals and emroidery pieces in progress are outcome of ReflectionChangeTranslation
















Embroidery pieces in progress after sketching the visuals.
children were introduced to patchwork.

Some of the sketches that kids came up with.