Recycling materials and cultural heritage

Discovery and Creation of
Migrating Objects

Recommended for

Women and/or children with migrant or refugee background

Duration and phases

4 sessions + a blended part that you can organise in 3 or 4 days

Number of participants

Between 5 and 12 persons

Part 1: Introduction

Objectives

1. Community building and communication
2. Developing vocabulary in local language
3. Creating cultural encounters within an intercultural group

Duration

Between 30 and 60 minutes depending on the number of participants

Materials needed

- Colorful spices

- Small plastic containers

- Smartphones

1. Collect as many types of spices as possible from various regions, countries, and cultures. Encourage participants to bring their favorite spices as well.

2. Have participants smell each other's spices and guess their origin.

3. Ask them to introduce themselves by sharing their name in their own language and then repeat it in the local language.

4.Inquire about how they use these spices and how they might imagine combining them with other flavors or dishes. Encourage them to share any memories associated with the spices.

5. As a supplementary digital activity, explore the textures of the spices through macro photography. Capture their visual nuances from a different perspective, and consider using a tiny microscope for an even closer look.

Part 2 : Discovery

Discovering and appropriating unfamiliar aesthetics

Learn more about the use of microscope from our tutorial

Objectives

1. Discovering artworks issued from a third culture.

2. Getting familiar with public spaces, resolving practical questions such as moving around the city and getting in touch with local people, institutions, etc.

3. Making participants familiar to the use of a museum or an art exhibition

Duration

Between 2 and 4 hours

Materials needed

- Travel tickets

- Museum tickets

- Smartphones

- WhatsApp or Messenger application

1. Find an exhibition showing artwork from divers cultures. The exercise is based on the idea of creating a common ground between local visual culture and the participants' culture of origin through discovering art objects from a third culture, so try to take this into consideration when you choose the exhibition or the museum you propose to visit.

2. Before the exhibition visit, ask the participants to take pictures of intriguing, exciting, strange or unfamiliar details. Photos may be taken of the whole art object or from details only with textures, shaped or colors. You may also ask the participants to take photos of each other while taking pictures of the exhibited objects in order to discover and document each others reactions and feelings towards the artworks.

3. Following the exhibition visit, create a WhatsApp or a Messenger group and ask them to share their photos. Help them with technical issues if they have any. In addition to make participants practicing the use of digital tools, this exercise helps you to find out what kind of art objects they are the most surprised or fascinated by.

Part 3 : Blended workshop

Finding familiar decorative details at home

Objectives

1. Change one's vision about surrounding objects in everyday life

2. Enhancing independent work and improving skills in photo making

3. Improving writing skills

4. Acquire analytical skills

Duration

30 minutes

Materials needed

- Smartphones

- WhatsApp or messenger application

1. As a blended part of the workshop, ask the participants to repeat the exercise of taking photos at home of decorative details that they like. This can also be a familiar objects, a piece of cloth or anything else that they find aesthetic.

2. Ask them to think about what makes these objects familiar or aesthetic for them. To improve writing skills, you can also ask them to note their ideas.

3. Ask them to share their photos with the group through WhatsApp or Messenger.

Part 4 : Discussion

Objectives

1. Finding common features in newly acquired experiences, sharing feelings, sensations and impressions

2. Improving communication skills and self expression

Duration

30 - 60 minutes depending on the number of participants

Materials needed

- Smartphones with previously taken photos

- WhatsApp or messenger application

- Eventually a video projector

1.If you have the necessary technical tools, such as video projector, you can create a virtual exhibition room of the photos taken during the exhibition and at home. This allows participants to see their photos side by side and facilitate to compare colors, patterns or shapes and to share their impressions about each other pictures as well. Otherwise, you can also talk about the pictures by showing them on the participants' mobile phones.

2. Engage them to find common features in the unfamiliar object seen during the exhibition and photos taken at home.

3. Find a common ground, something in the exhibition that they all have appreciated. It can be a specific association of colors, geometric shapes, something unusual still intriguing.

For example, the participants could be intrigued by the surprising use of extremely vivid colors in some popular art or by the unfamiliar way in which familiar topics are represented.

4. This conversation session can be linked to the creative workshop so that learners can find immediate and direct inspiration in what they have just discovered when you launch the creative activity.

Part 5: Creation

Objectives

1. Interpreting and personalizing newly gained experience through creation

2. Sense making of recycling, awareness raising about the link between creating objects and protecting the environment

3. Discovering and recycling skills

4. Creating souvenirs to remind positiveexperience of theworkshops

Duration

30 - 60 minutes depending on the number of participants

Materials needed

- UV resin in small portions, one per participant

- Spices and grains collected from home- Small plastic bottles to hold the spices

- Wooden sticks to mix species with resin

- Pliers

- Jewellery findings such as hooks for earrings, hoops for pendants and bails

- Silicone mats and plastic gloves

- Hoops of different forms made of metal

- Small UV lamps or a place exposed to sunlight

NB : For further materials, please see a more detailed description below

- Tongs

- Driller or needles

To create recycled jewellery or talismans of spices you purchase and prepare the following materials and tools:

1. Metal findings (steel, brass or copper). You can propose learners to try to find them at home, for instance by dissembling old pieces that they don't wear anymore.

2. Silicone pads to apply the resin on it and to protect your table.

3.Wooden sticks to mix the spices or the pigments with the resin and to apply it.

4.UV resin that you can order on the Internet or buy in an arts and crafts shop. UV resin, unlike resin epoxy can be hardened immediately with the help of a UV lamp and allows you to create art pieces within your workshops that the participants can take home immediately after.

5. Small UV lamps or a place where you can expose the talismans to the sunshine.

If you work in a sunny place, protect your resin from sunshine while working on your pieces as it risks to harden immediately.

6. Plastic bottle caps to mix resin and spice in it.

7. Finely powdered colourful spices or pigments

8. Plastic gloves for each participant to protect their hands. Don't forget to mention not to touch their eyes or face while working with resin.

9. For assembling your pieces, you will also need a driller or needles and jewellery pliers that you can also replace by tongs (see them bellow).

How to proceed:

1. Place one ore more metal findings on a silicone pad. You can play with them to create an original composition.

2. Put a little bit of pigments or finely powdered spice into a plastic cap.

3.Mix it with a little quantity of UV resin.

4.Fill out gently and carefully your finding placed on the silicone pad.

5. Place your talisman under the UV for 1 or 2 minutes lamp to harden it. When you're done, turn in gently and dry the back side as well for 1 or 2 minutes. If you don't have a UV lamp, put it directly on a sunny surface and keep it there without touching for 10-15 minutes on both sides. Be careful while moving with your piece while the resin is still liquid.

6. With your tongs, peel off gently the exceeding resin from the back side. Don't wait to long, if it is completely hard, it is more difficult to peel it off.

7. Take some time to admire the texture and the colours.

8. With a thin drill bit, make a hole into your talisman close to the edges. Be careful with the driller and place your talisman on a solid surface. Try not to drill through your finger. If you don't have a driller or you don't want to use it for security reasons, you can also pierce your talisman with a needle. In this second case, you will need to work quickly and carefully while the resin is not entirely hard yet. Do it as if you were working with the driller, on a hard surface and pierce it gently, otherwise the resin risks to come off the metal frame.