Happy Hollow: part 1; Carbon Footprint Dress

Happy Hollow Elementary School Art Room Carbon Footprint Dress,
May 24th - June 5th

This Spring I was happy and honored to be hired by the Happy Hollow Elementary School in Wayland, MA as their artist-in-residence.  They received a grant to have an artist come and talk to the students about using recycled materials in art, a topic that I am quite familiar with :).  

One of the many signs that greeted me at Happy Hollow

This was such an incredible experience that it will not fit into just one blog post ~ so there be a few and here is part 1.

I met with art teacher Christine Soeltz in March to discuss my 'residency'.  As usual my brain was buzzing with millions of ideas of things I could do :)

We decided that I would give a slide presentation to the grades about art that uses unique, recycled and non-traditional materials.  I also wanted to create an interactive sculpture with which the students could help me and a memento that would stay at the school - (more about this is the next blog :). 

 

I also felt that it would be a great occasion to install a carbon footprint dress (click here to read more about this series). During this 'residency' I had a specific place and a certain amount of time and the kids would be 'involved' in creating the dress. So after my first morning of lectures, with the help of MANY eager art students I installed a carbon footprint dress in the art room.

It was awesome how much all the students wanted to help!! and how excited they were about the project. I always like to add some details so we tried to put on an "H" for Happy Hollow.  Of course Chris and I wondered how the 'dress' would survive in an elementary school's art room but it did and in fact it looks GREAT!!

We figured over a thousand people walked over, on top of the dress! When I finally took the dress back to my studio to take off the tape stencil - the dress was a wonderful color, showing the pattern of the floor as well as a few random marks from art supplies. The small tape details had not lasted long but as Chris and I told the students - this is an 'experiment'.  That is what I love about the carbon footprint dress - it is a visual representation of the activity of the place and time that the dress is installed. 

Great detail at the edge of tape

wonderful color

the pattern of the floor as well as a few random marks from art supplies

Stay tune for more from my marvelous residency @ Happy Hollow!

Happy weekend and stay cool!!!

PEACE