Breast Dialogues: Creativity Heals
Project Goal:
Conduct a series of co-developed group workshops where the process of creativity is used as a springboard for individual therapy sessions and healing. The workshop series is an eight-week commitment. On alternate weeks, the group will focus on creative activities followed by individual therapy sessions. The workshops goal is to to initiate self-care rituals and foster trust in creative spirit.
Who:
Visual artist, Carol Koffel, (www.newliefdesigncenter.com) in collaboration with University of San Francisco’s Center for Child and Family Development (www.usfca.edu) will hold a pilot series of workshops focused on experiences of women.
What:
The inspiration for the workshops comes from a series of porcelain breast prints called “Being Alive: Women of Light” I made during a residency in Holland. When women see them, they’ve openly shared intimate and deeply personal experiences of becoming or being a woman. The discovery that the porcelain busts freed others to share rarely disclosed stories, motivated me to launch Breast Dialogues: Creativity Heals workshops.
Session One:
Introduction story of my experience and example collages: 10 minutes
Invite every one to make a collage. Stressing there is no need to create a specific story. Encourage them to trust their sub conscious minds and create a collage using images torn from various magazines without thinking too much. Select images in response to being drawn to particular images, an intuitive response. Cut these out and then collage it onto the cardboard panels.
Collage: 20 minutes
Group Storytelling: 3 minutes each person
Participants take a few minutes to look at their finished collage. Then in teams of two, ask them to each share what they see.
“When I look at your collage, I see…”
“I see in my collage,”
Stream of Conscious writing: 10 minutes
Each participant records in his or her own handwriting a story or stories.
Session Two:
Individual Counseling using collage experience as springboard
Session Three:
Presentation of Being Alive Series: Women of Light: 10 minutes
Making Personalized Breast Dialogues 30 minutes
Using pre-made forms of the upper bodice of women (plaster casts from real women or manikins– participants drape thin pre made slabs of porcelain over these forms to make a breast print.
Summary Sharing or Storytelling drawn from clay exercise: 10 minutes
Session Four:
Individual therapy sessions use Breast Dialogue as springboard
Session Five:
Delivery of fired pieces: 10 minutes
Glaze or record their story on the pieces: 40 minutes
Session Six:
Individual therapy session using Breast Dialogue Story as springboard
Session Seven:
Final Pieces Delivered: Living with your art – Listening in stillness to what you’ve made.
Group celebration and closing or workshop
Conduct a series of co-developed group workshops where the process of creativity is used as a springboard for individual therapy sessions and healing. The workshop series is an eight-week commitment. On alternate weeks, the group will focus on creative activities followed by individual therapy sessions. The workshops goal is to to initiate self-care rituals and foster trust in creative spirit.
Who:
Visual artist, Carol Koffel, (www.newliefdesigncenter.com) in collaboration with University of San Francisco’s Center for Child and Family Development (www.usfca.edu) will hold a pilot series of workshops focused on experiences of women.
What:
The inspiration for the workshops comes from a series of porcelain breast prints called “Being Alive: Women of Light” I made during a residency in Holland. When women see them, they’ve openly shared intimate and deeply personal experiences of becoming or being a woman. The discovery that the porcelain busts freed others to share rarely disclosed stories, motivated me to launch Breast Dialogues: Creativity Heals workshops.
Session One:
Introduction story of my experience and example collages: 10 minutes
Invite every one to make a collage. Stressing there is no need to create a specific story. Encourage them to trust their sub conscious minds and create a collage using images torn from various magazines without thinking too much. Select images in response to being drawn to particular images, an intuitive response. Cut these out and then collage it onto the cardboard panels.
Collage: 20 minutes
Group Storytelling: 3 minutes each person
Participants take a few minutes to look at their finished collage. Then in teams of two, ask them to each share what they see.
“When I look at your collage, I see…”
“I see in my collage,”
Stream of Conscious writing: 10 minutes
Each participant records in his or her own handwriting a story or stories.
Session Two:
Individual Counseling using collage experience as springboard
Session Three:
Presentation of Being Alive Series: Women of Light: 10 minutes
Making Personalized Breast Dialogues 30 minutes
Using pre-made forms of the upper bodice of women (plaster casts from real women or manikins– participants drape thin pre made slabs of porcelain over these forms to make a breast print.
Summary Sharing or Storytelling drawn from clay exercise: 10 minutes
Session Four:
Individual therapy sessions use Breast Dialogue as springboard
Session Five:
Delivery of fired pieces: 10 minutes
Glaze or record their story on the pieces: 40 minutes
Session Six:
Individual therapy session using Breast Dialogue Story as springboard
Session Seven:
Final Pieces Delivered: Living with your art – Listening in stillness to what you’ve made.
Group celebration and closing or workshop
