ArTELIER: 31st October led by Kitty and Nathan

This session was held in Windsor Community Precinct Launceston, members of the group who couldn’t make it joined us from the Underwood Centre via zoom. It was themed Valuing youth arts: as a stepping stone and place of experimentation. Empowering young people to speak through theatre and arts to adults. With the question

How do we challenge negative, perceptions surrounding student theatre, youth work, and young people’s art?   

Provocateurs:  Caitlin Comerford, Artistic Director of Stompin and Jack 11 year-old participants of Stompin Youth

Caitlin introduced us to the core idea at Stompin “that when young people collaborate with professional artists they can create inspiring, bold and relevant new dance works”. She detailed for us how “Stompin involves young people in every aspect of their creative process, from conception to realisation” and how the participants drive the direction of the outcome from the beginning. She explained that the youth involved in Stompin have a relationship more focused on mentorship and an authentic relationship building rather than outcomes. This mentorship exposes the participants to many levels of the performance industry and includes much more than just working on a show.  Caitlin also detailed the diverse venues that the company use with each performance being site–specific. The choice of this site is driven by participants and creates a community as it develops which allows the company a wide reach in terms of audience engagement.

Caitlin was joined by 11 year old Jack, our first young provocateur. Jack spoke of being a participant in Stompin Youth and its impact on him. It was powerful to hear how confidently he spoke about the importance of of the relationships and experiences gained from his participation.

http://www.stompin.net/about

Sharing Practice:

Tesnio and boundaries in drama

Bella Young, recently returned from mentorships and work overseas presented on Empowerment in the Arts: tension and boundaries. She spoke candidly about the complexities and her difficulties in youth theatre. She led us in a powerful physical activity, exploring tension and boundaries, which heightened and challenged our awareness of our physicality in the space and our relationships to our colleagues.

Kitty and Nathan presented on their work in the arts with youth though Rising Phoenix giving examples of projects and the impacts on individuals. They also spoke on barriers to engagement and their experience, skills and strategies working with participants experiencing a range of issues such as abuse, literacy, gender, and poverty. http://www.risingphoenixstudios.org/about.html

Kitty and Nathan shared a couple of warm up activities they use and we broke into groups and undertook a drawing activity using a table and dice game to prompt collaborative drawing.

The Long Table discussion

A Long Table discussion in the afternoon allowed for lively debate about the topics discussed in the day and we concluded with a reflective walk at The Gorge.