Fourteenth International Conference on the Arts in Society

Abstract

The Finnish company Hide&Seek Ltd. works with a community artwork consisting of small bronze sculptures made in artist-led workshops with different kinds of people: children, elderly, businessmen. The sculptures will be permanently mounted in urban space, and people can search them with a mobile map. Our important focus group is institutionalized children. We were currently granted funding from the Finnish Ministry of Culture and Education for developing a self-reflection method, where the bronze sculpture can be seen as a symbol of oneself. In the workshop, children are encouraged to create an alter-ego character, who may have some similar features as their creators, but as well some imaginary ones. The characters will be molded in the workshop, and a professional caster will cast them in bronze. There will be two copies made: one will be mounted in the institution, the other one will stay with the child. After creating the characters there will be storytelling workshops, where the children invent life stories for their character. It is possible to use words, voice or images. This will be saved on a web application (which will be published in November 2018). The children will have their personal passwords so they can go to add pieces to the story at any time. They can, for example, take photos of their copy of the character in different locations and post them to their account. The caretakers in the institution can use the evolving story as a tool for discussion.