Make Natural Spaces Clean and Your Art Class Green
A personal journey in repurposing disposables By Gerald Banting
“If you wear your knowledge ‘round your neck like pearls instead of chains, you are a lucky man.”
— lyrics from the song O Lucky Man by British musician Alan Price
Bowmanville, Ontario (now part of the wider community of Clarington). As a teen-aged art student, I drew inspiration from the Canadian wilderness painters, and then the wider fame of the Post Impressionists, particularly Paul Cezanne. Their work nudged me into seeing the “ordinary magic” of the natural world in a fresher way. All told, then, I am a lucky man — a Baby Boomer who loves the realm of visual art, along with the kingdom of trees and forests, and working with wood… and one who despises the ignorant destruction and willful waste so pervasive in modern society. This is the question that has continually arisen throughout my teaching and my present-day volunteer work: What should I do about these concerns as a teacher and visual artist? I suppose the answers are somewhat obvious. Regardless, they have become guiding principles for me:
T
HE PEARLS OF THE natural world have gracefully fallen into my life since my happy childhood with the woods, fields, and streams along the edge of
1. Celebrate and renew visual art processes that respect nature; exhibit work regularly, while also sharing it online.
2. Challenge myself to undo ecological damage in local parks and conservation areas, and make it a significant part of my own artistic process.
3. Share time, resources, and project ideas with teachers and their classes.
4. Encourage young people to get away from their screens and find hands-on connections to the natural world.
I remember the exhilaration I felt when my students and
I had a good day out in the natural world. I hoped the stu- dents would recognize its life-enhancing effects. After all, it is commonly known that nature immersion can help a person withstand the pressures of modern life and ward off men- tal illnesses like depression. On some of our field trips, we would bring art works with us to sketch or photograph them in natural settings. Now, my own personal field trips to parks and conservation areas involve drawing and/or photography, and the collection of human-made disposable items. This all evolved to become a thing that I call The Mayday Project. What follows is a chronicling of this project, along with some ideas about how you could apply its various activities with middle and high school students.
Green Teacher 119 Page 7
Photo credit: Gerald Banting
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