Museum of the Missing

Poster activity for the Museum of the Missing

In the dead of Winter, tucked safely out of the cold and creeping fog, a group of young people were working hard. Cocooned in the 1970s-era offices of 133 End St, they were Digging Up the Missing, Discovering the Forgotten and Exploring the Unseen. Through a series of guided creative workshops, self-directed and collaborative brainstorming, participants were building on their creativity and imagination to weave the MUSEUM of the MISSING into existence. 

< The Missing Sock

I was very fortunate to be involved as a Facilitator in this quirky and clever local project by  Outback Theatre for Young People, alongside two other amazing local artists - Chantall Barnes and Meg Williams. Over almost three months, these Young Artists and Curators excavated ideas, broke down concepts (and built them back up), cut and pasted words (and eyebrows), pulled faces, took photos, concocted tall tales, performed and told stories, gathered skills (and pineapples), pulled more faces, dreamed up lives and conspiracies, explored cultural connections, podcasted, made shadow puppets, drew blindly, made fossils, constructed puzzles, hummed and drummed, printed fruit, recorded moments in time and created Worlds. They grew in confidence and learned many new skills, wielding a magic greater than the individual to create a collaborative space and voice to share with the community.

We workshopped drawing and mapped our emotional worlds within ...

... made cyanotypes with fruit and learned about photographic techniques and history...

... built worlds and wove stories together ...

... painted from the heart with Chelsea Lilford ...

... worked with clay to record impressions of the world around us ...

... played with blackout poetry and used negative space to define the positive ...

... exercised our observational drawing, "I can draw!"...

... created shadow puppets and built worlds from the darkness ...

... explored podcasting and sound recording ... and so much more!

My heart belongs to this work, the bringing together of young people and the young at heart, using creativity to connect individuals to each other and themselves. Like a ripple in a pond, the ideas spread out into the community and offered many moments of growth and reward to the Creators throughout the process and in the showcasing of the final works.