What an amazing first day!

We had 7 participants all up. Denise Darnel from Queensland Health assisted me and her help was priceless on this first day. Her passion and sheer excitement for the program is nothing but inspiring. I'd also like to thank the Ipswich Art Society and Brian from 

OCHICA (The Old Ipswich Courthouse managing body) for their support and for supplying the space for our temporary studio.

What can I say – all left with huge smiles on their faces at the end of the workshop today. We started out with self portrait paintings on the side of brown paper bags. There were no mirrors involved in the process. The requirement was to paint "who they are" at that moment. Every portrait was spot on. They managed to interpret their personalities perfectly. (I look froward to seeing the "objects that mean something" which will be brought in their brown paper bags next week for subject matter). 

Our first group exercise was a collaborative mural. We painted and drew on one huge canvas laid flat on the tables. The fun part was that each individual was encouraged to move to music (African drumming and new age). Lots of blue and purple hues to start with, water, finger painting, hand painting etc. etc. The canvas was lifted vertically to let the paint run into some amazing patterns and accidental marks. This mural will be a work in progress with many layers over an 8 week period before it will be exhibited as part of the group exhibition.

I was amazed and to be honest, did not expect to see such a surrender to the process at hand today. It was like watching kindergarten children in that free state of mind that we had before we were influenced by so much constraint around expression.

I have sent all participants home with homework. They will be working in their visual diaries on a regular basis (hopefully!); and will also be spending time contemplating their items "that mean something to them".

Next week we will be adding another layer to our collaborative mural, demonstrating mediums, and starting work on the subject studies.