workshops, workshops, workshops

The art action group kicked off it’s first workshop of the semester at BICAS last Friday. There was an abundance of supplies and even a well organized idea and direction manual on jewelry making tips, thanks to Shana. Michelle brought a bunch of great examples of bike jewelry she made in the past. For me, having all of the examples out among the bike parts and beads was very inspiration. Unfortunately, I could only stay for two hours because I had to go to work. During my hours, I untangled and disassembled old jewelry to reuse the beads. This potentially tedious process turned out to be therapeutic. Sometime when in a less creative mood, I enjoy observing the people around, which is what I did while unstringing beads from old tacky necklaces. After all the supplies were set up and a few visitors had joined our class group, Michelle led a demo that included a few basic skills such as wire wrapping. The materials were small, but she did a great job and I think everyone got a chance to see what was going on because of the comfortable size of the group. People were not shy about browsing through the bike parts. I spent the little time I had left cutting up bike tires into little rings. I had been inspired by a website posted on our D2L page (I think, or maybe it was the BICAS facebook page) and wanted to provide others easy access to the materials to make the tire necklaces if they desired. One lady who was doing work hours in the shop had very curious about the group of girls sitting in the back. She sat down to join the workshop and told me that she was doing work hours to earn points to buy a bike because she wanted to ride with her kids but didn’t have enough money to buy one. The woman remarked again and again as the workshop proceeded, that she had never seen or heard of such a class that collaborated with community groups, or that even specialized in art education at all. She said she had never done anything like jewelry making before and was astonished by the opportunity we were providing. It really hit me at the moment that this is what Casey was striving for when she said she wanted different types of people to attend the auction, people that may be unfamiliar with art events or art making in general. I really hope that this woman decides to come to the auction to see the piece she made.

Tuesday was the wallet (and coin purse) making workshop on the mall. I arrived around 9:45 am to pick up the event permit from the events office in the student union. The other members of the group arrived at 10:00 am with the supplies, which I helped to carry and set up. We had tables with the craft materials, as well as promotional materials to inform people that walked by but may not have had time to make a wallet. Behind the tables were blankets for people to sit on and make art. Most of the class ended up sitting in a circle on the blankets, sewing little wallets and coin purses. I thought it was very cute and laid back, something that if I was walking by and saw I would think looked fun. A few

people were sitting at the table sewing and others were simply handing out fliers and informing people about BICAS and the auction. Even though most of the people that participated in the workshop were students in the class, I think that it helped to strengthen our class community and gave a positive view of the BICAS community to the university students.