Thursday 4 August 2016

Under the Same Sun: June Roundup

This summer, the South London Gallery presents Under the Same Sun: Art from Latin America Today, an exhibition of Latin American art produced in collaboration with the Guggenheim Museum as part of the Guggenheim UBS MAP Global Art Initiative

To celebrate, we've been responding to some of the works in the exhibition on Saturdays at the Shop of Possibilities: playing with materials the Under the Same Sun artists have used, building similar structures, and experimenting with the artists' techniques. Here's a rundown of what we got up to in June:

On the first Saturday in June, we picked up our paintbrushes and produced a collaborative temporary mural on the floor outside the Shop of Possibilities, inspired by Federico Herrero's commissioned mural on the playground on Pelican Estate.





As the mural gradually got washed away in the following days, it became a perfect site for inventing new games, hopping from one coloured square to another during a pillow fight!


The following weekend, we built a drum kit inspired by Carlos Amorales' We'll See How Everything Reverberates...then we spent the rest of the rainy afternoon making lots of noise!

Left: Carlos Amorales, We'll See How Everything Reverberates, 2012. © Carlos Amorales. Photo courtesy Kristopher McKay
The Playworkers started off another session by building a teetering tower of balanced objects, stacked carefully to echo the tortillas in Damian Ortega's Tortillas Construction Module

Left: Damián Ortega, Tortillas Construction Module, 1998. © Damián Ortega. Photo courtesy Kristopher McKay
Throughout the afternoon, children deconstructed the stack, taking objects and re-appropriating them for their own play: the barrel became a ship, a table and a comfy sofa.



On the final Saturday in June, the temporary tattoos produced as part of Under the Same Sun were put to good use as we set up the first ever Shop of Possibilities tattoo parlour!






Check back next month for July's roundup of Under the Same Sun-inspired play!

Tuesday 12 July 2016

Play Pieces: June 2016

We've been enjoying some beautiful sunshine at the Shop of Possibilities this month, playing outside as much as possible! Here's what we've been doing...

We had a pillow fight...
...pulled each other around...
...played with boundaries...
...learnt to make books...
...smashed up chairs!...
...and did lots of handstands!


Tuesday 21 June 2016

Recycling Tape

What started as a bit of tape over the door...
...quickly became a challenge to cover the WHOLE door!
Adding more and more and more tape until...

But the broken scraps of tape didn't go to waste...
...they soon became a football...
...and then a tennis ball!







Tuesday 31 May 2016

Play Pieces: May 2016

We've been busy this month at the Shop of Possibilities! Here's what we've been up to...


We said goodbye to Lauren :( ...

...built a goal...

...then scored some goals!

We claimed a piece of land...

...piled everything up...

...cocooned ourselves in blankets...

...rode a train...

...played with water...

...and drove around in our car!






Friday 20 May 2016

Vrooooom!

Even on a busy Saturday, we still found time for a bit of engineering! What started as a very simple car with two wheels was gradually added to throughout the session - by the end the children had made a convertible complete with comfy cushioned seats and steering wheel!

Deciding on parts...
Attaching the wheels...
Creating a steering wheel...
Room for two passengers!

Friday 4 March 2016

Play Pieces: February 2016

February might be a short month, but there was still time to play...

We built stuff

Drank tea

Built a cool outdoor tent...

...and a squishy indoor tent

Put ourselves in a netted bag and let our mates carry us around

Built a plastic den to shelter from the rain

And tied up the playworkers!


Friday 5 February 2016

Play Pieces: January 2016

Here's a selection of things that happened throughout January...

We did some gardening

Made a fire

Played chase...

...that led to some falling over!

Trapped people on the slide


 
Lit some candles

Sorted through a lot of mixed up wool

Changed what the inside of the SOP looked like

Built a ladder

And squeezed into some very small spaces!