Saturday, March 05, 2011

lenten creativity: clay for the wilderness

A creationary: a space to be creative with the lectionary. For more resources go here.

This is a fantastically creative Lenten activity. Methodist minister, Ric Stott, has made 40 clay figures (link with Ash Wednesday) and located them in and around Sheffield (into the wilderness) for 40 days (one for each day of Lent) to see what happens as they interact with the world. Ric blogs here

This gets towards the heart of what I am trying to explore with this project, when I finally gather up all that remains (which may well be very little) we will be able to see what effect the world has had on these fragile figures. Some will be worn down by rain, wind and time, some will have been swept away by street sweepers or stolen, or crushed underfoot. One remains in a church where, I suspect, it will stay safe and unchanged.

I remember when my first child was born – he was so fragile and perfect, untouched by the rigours of life. I was aware as soon as we stepped out of the sterile hospital into the cloud of smokers congregating at the entrance that moving out into the world meant becoming polluted, becoming dirty and damaged. But what kind of life is spent in a sterile space? It’s when we start to get dirty that we change, grow and become more human.

Each has a note inviting those who find them to take a photo and email it. It’s tactile, it’s public, it’s potentially interactive, it’s curiousity rousing. Good stuff.

Hat tip Jonny.

Posted by steve at 08:07 PM

2 Comments

  1. Reminds me of Book Crossing – books released into the wild (left on a park bench, train, in a cafe etc) then tracked via their special bookplate and the Book Crossing website as they travel from one “finder” to another. http://www.bookcrossing.com πŸ™‚

    Comment by Maureen Howland — March 5, 2011 @ 10:35 pm

  2. Thanks Maureen. I had that thought as well, and nearly linked to a post I wrote quite some years ago about that (http://www.emergentkiwi.org.nz/archive/book-crossing/). But I was also aware that books are designed to be passed on in book crossing, while these seem more static.

    I’ve thought about how this type of guerrilla art might work here in Adelaide. Angels in ice at Advent?

    steve

    Comment by steve — March 5, 2011 @ 10:43 pm

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