The Beginning of Exploration – ‘Discovering My Self’ April – June 2009 at Colebrook Day Service By Nickova, 22nd of April 2009
22nd April 2009:
First session: ISIS – challenging behaviour – and SPECTRUM – autistic spectrum disorder
Participants: Jason (ISIS) plus support worker Andy, Anna (ISIS), James (SPECTRUM)
Photographer and assistance: Ana Kuzan
Artists: Sue Sargeaunt and Nickova
Duration: each participant was working for about 1hour with one-to–one support from the artists (Jason also had support from his support worker Andy)
Pre – thoughts before the first session:
Before packing the material it came into my mind that I had no plan. Even though I had discussed (with Sue) in detail on the 25th of March about our approaches, I felt blank. The project is not to be set up like a school class where you predict didactically every minute of what and how to teach, however just putting out some materials for the participants and saying “choose what you like” would, in my experience, not work either. We will have participants from ISIS and SPECTRUM, with challenging behaviour and autistic spectrum disorders, (difficulties to focus, no verbal speech, easily agitated and distressed.) We have discussed lots of methods but not what it actually is we are going to do the very first session. It should be something simple, not too overwhelming but interesting and encouraging. I made my decision whilst jogging: We will start with paint and paper. Later I decided together with Sue that we would use only the primary colours; red, blue, yellow, some white and black. Sue has organised small easels. We decided to have different ‘stations’ to paint: Sitting in front of the easels, standing and painting on paper spread out on a table, painting on large paper hanging on the wall or on a large canvas on the floor.
Painting is direct and will provide direct results. I believe a blue brush stroke on a white paper, for example, has something very attractive. Working in large format is new to most of the participants. There is the challenge of the new and the attraction of the paint, the colour, smell, touch and texture. Drawing large formats is more difficult; most people have experienced drawing but only on small-scale papers. Drawing large might be better experienced later. So we decided to start with painting. The concept in detail will be created and defined whilst we are going along with the project.
It was at first not clear to me how to use the room although we had previously viewed the room and discussed some ideas. We would not know how it might work before we had put everything out, such as tables, easels etc.
In addition I did not know the people I was expecting to work with. Although Sue sent me their names and told me which part of the units they were coming from we omitted to get information about character and communication ability. The presentation we gave to service users and staff was more about passing on information about the project Exploration. We should have made sure that we had an insight of participant’s character and ability, particularly for me, as I am external to the centre. This was not intentional; we simply missed it during a busy preparation phase.
Sue and I have agreed to pull-in a photographer for the important documentation and evaluation. It is a huge advantage to have someone else to take the pictures whilst we can focus on the facilitation. Unfortunately we did not think about this when writing the proposal so we have no budget and the payment has to come from some of the material money.
It was Ana Kuzan, a young woman with creative interest and a good photographer, who agreed to work for us about every fortnight for a small fee.
Ana has already been with us at the day service for one of our presentations to mainstream users and staff and has introduced herself to the people involved.
Arrival and set up:
We arrived on Wednesday in time to set up and were greeted by Colin (service user) who announced that he will take part in the Friday session, and Vincent (service user) was right there to show us to the room and to help unloading the car.
Sue arrived and we started to set up the different ‘painting- stations’, including two tables for the material (paint, water, brushes, A1 paper). We were not able to cover the whole floor because of lack of cover.
(At this stage not all proposed money has come in yet. Sue has started negotiation with Brewers management from Redhill (Andrew) to get some material donated. This is still in process and we have to organise ourselves as best as we can for the start)
Setting up for the first time took us longer than scheduled and we started slightly later than planned. The staff at least was informed and helped to get the participants ready dressed in their painting clothes.
P.S.
Please also read Sues impression and the following diary pages for the separate groups of ISIS and Spectrum on Wednesday and OASIS (multiple needs) and Mainstream Users (Portrait Group) on Firdays.
