Yesterday five secondary school age pupils made their totems – infact they enjoyed it so much they made two each. With great results – a bit of a sea of glitter but all the better for it!
Today some lovely Year ones from Studfall Infants made 10 totems between them and did some amazing work.
A mad and frantic day. Not a good start when Martin got lost on the way to installation site to meet electricians – turns out that the postcode is wrong on all the invitations and press info that I have sent out – I have no idea how that happened as I cut and pasted from Fineshade Woods website.
After that we had a mad scramble to get everything ready for the first totem making workshop. This is no small task as it involves the logistics of 8ft canes, plastic floor covering 2m poles, paint, beads, glitter, sand and general messy stuff. With the help of my lovely assistant Mair we got it done with two minutes to spare.
The children only had an hour and a half to do what should take a whole day and did an amazing job – with great focus they painted their tubes, stuck, glittered and made leaves all in the allotted time.
Meanwhile Martin took my group on a research walk – with his specialist knowledge they had an amazing experience and didn’t want to leave when it was time to go home.
At the end of the day the lights are not all done but I’m really delighted with the way they look even without the totems on top… We had some helpful rangers who lopped down low brances ready for totems and the site now looks pretty good.
Martin is here to do his sound workshop tomorrow with 5 students. He has a parabolic microphone reflector which looks very impressive and professional. He had his first glimpse of Fineshade woods today and is looking forward to taking the kids out to make some recordings.
I will be doing my first making workshop with a group of twelve children who will be doing super fast totem making. I seem to have accumulated the worlds biggest collection of green fabric for the leaves so they will be more summery than autumnal.
The electrican Robert is fitting the lights – very nerve racking. I hope they fit.
Another group of children today this time years 4 and 5 – for a woodland research walk – they were great! All got lots of leaves and bark etc and enjoyed making their project books.
I wanted to show them the site for installation but on our way there we were stopped short in our tracks by a sign saying that the rangers were using live amunition in the woods. Not a pleasant walk with that going on! I don’t think Health and Safety would approve if we went in there!
Yesterday was a really good day and the project feels like a real thing now – not just a lot of e-mails, phone calls and boxed up springs.
We have put in the stakes ready to support all the tree totems. This went much more smoothly than I anticipated due to the great practical skills and knowledge of Hugh who has cut all the stakes and helped me to put in the stakes (well I say helped me – he had the big mallet – I strategically positioned the stakes). Even without the totems they look good and we had a couple of interested onlookers who will be visiting when the installation is in place.
I also now have the batteries to power the lights – they weigh a ton! I will have a body builder physique by the end of this project with the daily lifting of 3 big batteries – I think I need to invest in a wheelbarrow to take them to the site.
Today was my first ‘research walk’ with some lovely year one pupils. They had all filled their collectiion bags with leaves and twigs in the first ten minutes and were very good at remembering tree names – I was very impressed! Another group tomorrow – years 4 and 5 so should be a different type of walk – I’m hoping they don’t quiz me too much on the trees as my tree knowledge is basic to say the least! I am learning more than anyone and can now recognise several trees (with crib notes of course) which was more than I could say last week. Thank god for Cheryl the great ranger at Fineshade who gave me a crash course in tree recognition!
Socially disengaged artist
