2013 Come Out Festival, The Future Gardens
The Future Gardens was a student driven project focused on schools actively engaging with The Come Out Festival to create beautiful growing sculptures.
We asked students to transform recycled, unwanted objects into pots and planters creating sculptural garden displays for a dormant space in their school.
The 'question' posed: How can yesterday’s junk become tomorrow’s living work of art? The Future Gardens transformed unwanted objects into growing sculptures supporting the notion that creativity is fundamental to sustainability.
The schools who enrolled in the Future Gardens were given access to a blog where they shared their progress and product with other children. this was a specially tailored educational safe site including several one minute tutorials on how to make the future gardens a reality. The workshops were integral to the development of the gardens by assisting the young artist to get 'growing'.
The chosen gardens were curated at the festival centre for the Opening Event and stayed for the duration of the ten day festival strengthening public interest in the venue and the event and ultimately building community.
We asked students to transform recycled, unwanted objects into pots and planters creating sculptural garden displays for a dormant space in their school.
The 'question' posed: How can yesterday’s junk become tomorrow’s living work of art? The Future Gardens transformed unwanted objects into growing sculptures supporting the notion that creativity is fundamental to sustainability.
The schools who enrolled in the Future Gardens were given access to a blog where they shared their progress and product with other children. this was a specially tailored educational safe site including several one minute tutorials on how to make the future gardens a reality. The workshops were integral to the development of the gardens by assisting the young artist to get 'growing'.
The chosen gardens were curated at the festival centre for the Opening Event and stayed for the duration of the ten day festival strengthening public interest in the venue and the event and ultimately building community.
Online Engagement. A Platform for Contribution and Connection
CALLING ALL GROWING ARTISTS:Let’s make dormant places beautiful.Let’s make ‘junk’ special again. And most importantly, let’s grow the future into something magical that we love.
Artists bring communities together, helping people grow and learn, sometimes using sculpture or paintings, but sometimes with a public event or even a garden.
Come Out Festival has given me the challenge of Dreaming the Future.
When I think of the future, I consider the environment and what kind of place I want to live in and enjoy. I then begin to think about what will happen to everything we have today.
What will be replaced? What will be thrown away? What will I grow out of? What will I grow tired of? What will I do with all my rubbish? What did my parents and teachers do with all their old and unwanted things and where are they now? Are they all in landfill polluting the environment? How can I reduce my effect on the environment by reusing and recycling my unwanted items? How can I turn them into something else that will make where I live and learn more beautiful places to grow and enjoy?
A Special Challenge for Schools – get involved!
My challenge for you is to Dream the Future with me. Imagine if your school was more colorful and beautiful with a place for art that grows thanks to your imagination. Can you think of a place in your school where no one expects a garden to grow made from objects that seem curious, funny or with a secret special meaning to you?
Rather than throwing out old unwanted things, imagine using your incredible imagination and skill with your hands to make something else and give those objects a new life. Something useful that can help us in the future.
What do we need more of in the future? Clean air, fresh water, trees, plants, food, fruit and vegetables? We definitely need less rubbish!
Think about what you might throw away because it no longer works, or is not as good as something new. It might me an old bike? Maybe a TV or computer? Maybe one of your old toys that you don’t play with anymore? Have you ever seen people’s old belongings thrown out on the streets? Maybe that old cupboard or chair could be turned into something new. Maybe rubbish isn’t always what it seems, a pile of junk has the potential to be something creative and beautiful that will grow.
Now it’s you turn to imagine and make it come ‘alive’ for your school
So get dreaming about ‘rubbish’ growing into a Future Garden of your own!
You will find plenty of helpful ideas in the Tutorial section of this blog, which is a very useful tool, another useful tool is your imagination. So think hard, be creative, and experiment with different ideas until you create something unique that you love and want to see grow!
Artists bring communities together, helping people grow and learn, sometimes using sculpture or paintings, but sometimes with a public event or even a garden.
Come Out Festival has given me the challenge of Dreaming the Future.
When I think of the future, I consider the environment and what kind of place I want to live in and enjoy. I then begin to think about what will happen to everything we have today.
What will be replaced? What will be thrown away? What will I grow out of? What will I grow tired of? What will I do with all my rubbish? What did my parents and teachers do with all their old and unwanted things and where are they now? Are they all in landfill polluting the environment? How can I reduce my effect on the environment by reusing and recycling my unwanted items? How can I turn them into something else that will make where I live and learn more beautiful places to grow and enjoy?
A Special Challenge for Schools – get involved!
My challenge for you is to Dream the Future with me. Imagine if your school was more colorful and beautiful with a place for art that grows thanks to your imagination. Can you think of a place in your school where no one expects a garden to grow made from objects that seem curious, funny or with a secret special meaning to you?
Rather than throwing out old unwanted things, imagine using your incredible imagination and skill with your hands to make something else and give those objects a new life. Something useful that can help us in the future.
What do we need more of in the future? Clean air, fresh water, trees, plants, food, fruit and vegetables? We definitely need less rubbish!
Think about what you might throw away because it no longer works, or is not as good as something new. It might me an old bike? Maybe a TV or computer? Maybe one of your old toys that you don’t play with anymore? Have you ever seen people’s old belongings thrown out on the streets? Maybe that old cupboard or chair could be turned into something new. Maybe rubbish isn’t always what it seems, a pile of junk has the potential to be something creative and beautiful that will grow.
Now it’s you turn to imagine and make it come ‘alive’ for your school
So get dreaming about ‘rubbish’ growing into a Future Garden of your own!
You will find plenty of helpful ideas in the Tutorial section of this blog, which is a very useful tool, another useful tool is your imagination. So think hard, be creative, and experiment with different ideas until you create something unique that you love and want to see grow!