In 2017 the Ipswich Museum hosted an exhibition of the work of artist Eduardo Paolozzi, alongside The Whitechapel Gallery’s major retrospective of his work.
I had interviewed the curator at Ipswich Museum as part of my third module at University, and we spoke about the possibility of working on a project delivering public engagement for the up and coming exhibition.
Engaging some of BA the students at Suffolk to volunteer, I organised an all-day family drop-in workshop, open to all 7+ and adults.
Inspired by the work of American Robert Rauschenberg (Tate Modern 2017) I decided to use a mixture of recycled materials.
Contacting Shoe World, who kindly donated me a large number of shoe boxes, I gathered together card, print and 3D toys and vintage paste jewellery to create a rich table of elements for the participants to use to create their own 3D Paolozzi inspired work, and they could see the real thing in the gallery next door if the wanted inspiration!
To reflect the retro vintage feel of his work I printed out some old images for the group to use in the collage which helped to give the same feel as the originals.
We had a number of families dropping in all day, and assisted by myself and the students from the BA, and i was absolutely thrilled to see some of the inspired ideas they came up with, some with very little help from the adults. All work created and inspired by the exhibition.
Some of the work created:
