Embrace a chaotic world

Social commentator Douglas Rushkoff wrote these words 11 years ago but they spoke loudly to me this morning as I read them in the snug cabin of my country Vline train:

"Our children, ironically, have already made their move. They are leading us in our evolution past linear thinking, duality, mechanism, heirarchy, metaphor and God himself towards a dynamic, animistic, weightless and recapitulated culture. Chaos is their actual environment."

One Hundred Languages

The Reggio Emilia Approach is inspiring me in my work today. It strengthens my belief that the arts is not a subject area, but a means by which children can create and communicate meaning across all learning areas. It also reminds me why we need to encourage all kinds of spiritual exploration with young people. The hundred languages poem says this much better than I could ever hope to:



The Hundred Languages

No way. The hundred is there.
The child
is made of one hundred.
The child has
a hundred languages
a hundred hands
a hundred thoughts
a hundred ways of thinking
of playing, of speaking.

A hundred always a hundred
ways of listening
of marveling, of loving
a hundred joys
for singing and understanding
a hundred worlds
to discover
a hundred worlds
to invent
a hundred worlds
to dream.

The child has
a hundred languages
(and a hundred hundred hundred more)
but they steal ninety-nine.
The school and the culture
separate the head from the body.
They tell the child:
to think without hands
to do without head
to listen and not to speak
to understand without joy
to love and to marvel
only at Easter and at Christmas.

They tell the child:
to discover the world already there
and of the hundred
they steal ninety-nine.

They tell the child:
that work and play
reality and fantasy
science and imagination
sky and earth
reason and dream
are things
that do not belong together.

And thus they tell the child
that the hundred is not there.
The child says:
No way. The hundred is there.


-Loris Malaguzzi (translated by Lella Gandini)
Founder of the Reggio Emilia Approach

friends

Many things confuse me in life, but my need for friendship has always been a given. And I'm incredibly lucky to have extraordinary people continually bounce into my life. Until recently, I have been terrified about the impending move away from my community of friends in Melbourne. But in the past few days I have started to get excited about moving to Kyneton (it's only one month away!). The "leaving Brunswick grief" is easing a bit and I have the "happy butterflies in pit of tummy" setting in. Today I am looking forward to:

1. having the space to host large dinners around our new table

2. time to sip tea in the sun on our new front porch with friends

Friends. They rock my world. Sometimes they even make me a musical documentary. Hilarious bliss.

eat the streets

I just got really excited to see that Canadian company Mamallian Diving Reflex have been back in Australia. They were in Launceston doing a new project called Eat the Streets:



"4 weeks, 12 restaurants. A jury of children deciding what they love, hate and which washroom is the worst."

Last year they brought the ‘Children’s Choice Awards’ to the Melbourne International Arts Festival. Primary school students from Footscray were given a chance to walk the red carpet and voice their opinions on shows they had seen during the Festival. It was pretty piss your pants funny. I was in stitches listening to rave reviews and some pretty harsh judgements. It was amazing to be in a space where children took the stage as the experts and reinvented the rules. The young people invented their own award categories which meant that the framework for the ceremony wasn't structured by adults with adult agendas. The event asked: what happens when adults and their important artistic agendas aren't the ones measuring the art? I was tickled pink by the award ceremony and left with many more questions than answers. And this is the sort of company I'd like to be asking questions with...

Darren and Natalie from the company are pretty awesome. They spoke at Artplay last year and it was really exciting to hear them talk about their work- much of which focuses on moments of connection (and much of their work in the past has been with young people- another favourite project is haircuts by children - where adults let young people cut their hair!) It's also very very cool that Lenine Bourke from YPAA is involved with their next project- it will be great to have more and more of this influence in our own youth arts sector.

On their website MDR talk about wanting to create work which:

‘dismantles the barriers between individuals, fostering a dialogue between audience members, between the audience and the material and between the performers and the audience.’

Brilliant.

painting rainbows

So, I thought I'd start a blog... I have always been quite nervous about making my thoughts so public, but have decided I'll ease into it for a while and see how I go. It might be nice to have my thoughts written in one place, Currently my thoughts are written on little scraps of paper all over my office and bedroom, in the margins of books I'm reading or in a dozen half finished notebooks and journals. It's time to consolidate.

I just wrote this piece for a youth arts magazine I contribute to called Lowdown and thought I'd put it here too:

I always make my husband tell me a story about him and a friend from Kindergarten days. Every morning they would fill up cans of paint, run over to the Kindergarten cubby house and paint it an array of bright and fabulous colours. The next day they would return and the cubby would miraculously be back to its dull brown. “Great!” they would shout, “this means we get to paint it all over again!” I love the way he tells this story: with a continuing sense of awe at the “rainbow coloured paint” that the teachers allowed them to use for their task. It has only been since he has been older and reflected on these occasions that his adult logic has kicked in and explained away the magic: the cans must have been filled with water, not magical rainbow paint. But in his memory he sees the cubby in all of its fabulous multi coloured glory. I am so inspired by this story of imagination and wonder. 

I get concerned that in many settings we don’t give ourselves the opportunity to maintain a sense of wonder and open up a whole spectrum of creative responses to life’s twists and turns.  When I was in a creative development last weekend, walking around with a cardboard box on my head, (we were robots-of course) I was reminded once again not to take the rehearsal room for granted. I felt really lucky to be in a space with friends and colleagues, having a chance to wonder and explore. I hope that in the midst of the busyness of life, you get some time to play and imagine. Personally, I think it’s the best bit.