The Body is Good
Workshops
The Body is Good
This workshop is designed for adults
1 - 3 days, 3-8 hrs per day
30 max Participants
This workshop is best for college students through adults, small groups of people wanting to explore their relationship to the body, to take on ableism through art to remind themselves their body is good; the perspective that the body is at its core good, working…Good for college campuses, art organizations, conferences, small businesses, or affinity groups for people with disabilities.
This is a DEIA workshop one could do in preparing to think about policies and practices in the workspace that is inclusive…because how can you treat other people well if you don’t know what it means to know you/your body is good
DESCRIPTION
Build artwork that is grounded in your body and your experience in ableism whether you are a person with a disability or not.: We do some movement work, painting and drawing, write love letters/poetry to significant bodies and we work with stencils to answer the question: how do we move, what moves us, and what fills us up?
This workshop is often taught with a dance/yoga instructor and/or a storyteller or other artists.
PART 1: Building Basic Materials
Introduction to The Body is Good
Starting with breath work and then create a simple movement piece together
PART 2: Creating Stencils
Learning about Stencils
Experimenting with Stencils
Designing your own stencils based on the earlier movement
PART 3: Creating The Body is Good Art
Writing a love letter to the body in the form of a mantra/poetry/zine
Creating collages or zines with stencils, shadow play with stencils, photographing with stencils or whatever 2-d art you are interested in creating based on the art prompt the body is good
Editing and weaving in the writing
PART 4: Sharing the work
Sharing our work it whatever way is right for the group
KEY TAKEAWAYS
The perspective that the body is good
A piece of artwork to remind participants that theIr body is good no matter what people say, how they feel or how their body changes
How to take a concept from idea to final product
Basic photography, editing skills
The Body is Good for
Young People
8-10 Sessions, 1.5 hours per session
15 max Participants
This workshop is best for Youth ages 6-12
DESCRIPTION
This series of classes invites young people to create artwork that will remind themselves, their friends and their family that the body is good, that it is always working hard. They will use the way the body works as a reference to create art.
PART 1: Building Basic Materials
Lesson Title: What we do
Values Activity: draw their breath, favorite activity, do action art
PART 2: Creating Stencils
Learning about Stencils
Experimenting with Stencils
Designing your own stencils
PART 3: Creating The Body is Good Art
Writing 3 word poetry and mantras about the body is good
Creating collages with stencils, shadow play with stencils, photographing with stencils
PART 4: Gallery walk
Inviting parents and community to see the work and students teach about how they created the work
KEY TAKEAWAYS
The perspective that the body is good
A piece of artwork to remind them that their body is good no matter what people say, how they feel or how their body changes
How to take a concept from idea to final product
Basic photography, editing skills
Matching words with images
A Love Letter to the Body: An Immersive Experience
Single day or ongoing course options available.
1 - 8 hr sessions
300 max participants
This workshop is best for community members ages 13 +, all participants should be living in the same region. This could be an artist residency, festivals, college courses or community class.
DESCRIPTION
The goal of this workshop is to create a space that is a love letter to the body and builds a contradiction to the ableist history of a particular location. We start with building a timeline based on the local and history of body based laws and practices that shaped who could do what with their bodies, for example slavery, laws about women’s employment, or sterilization practices.
Then we do a series of art works to look at our own relationship to the body: We create a short movement piece, painting, drawing, photography, writing letters, poetry, zines to answer the question of how do we move, what moves us, what are our access needs, and what is the impact of ableism on us.
Then we work collaboratively to build a space that meets everyone’s access needs…this might be a permanent structure such as a room or a temporary structure such as an event tent or a model such as a doll house. We would design everything from the floors to the ceiling, from the outside walls to the inside walls, the walls would hold our stories, from the historical timelines to the artwork we did and most importantly, the structure would meet our access needs. Then the space would be used to hold discussions about the project, classes on art creation, and performances. Permanent structures would be ever-changing to meet the access needs of whoever would be using the space.
This workshop is often taught with a dance/yoga instructor and/or a storyteller or other artists.
PART 1: Building Basic Materials | Local body based history
Introduction to the body is good
Build a body based timeline of local history and practices
PART 2: Creating Artwork to Contradict the Ableism We Have Internalized
Starting with breath work and then create a simple movement piece together
Creating photos from the movement piece and creating stencils from those photos
Experimenting with Stencils, creating collages, photographs, zines, paintings and drawings
Writing a love letter to the body in the form of a mantra/poetry/zine
Creating final pieces of art that integrate the writing
PART 3: Creating A Communal Love Letter to the Body
Brainstorming
Designing
Engaging experts if needed
Building
PART 4: Sharing the work
Grand Opening
Holding art based events in the space
KEY TAKEAWAYS
A perspective and understanding of the big picture of ableism in a location
How ableism affects participants as an individual
A piece of artwork to remind participants that their body is good no matter what people say, how they feel or how their body changes
How to take a concept from idea to final product
How to name and frame your access needs
How to create body based artwork, artwork that honors both that the body is always working and the struggles of the body
Basic art skills
A sense of community that is anti-ableist
Professional Best Practices for Business:
An Audit of Space, policies, and practices, as a love letter to the body
Single day or 5 day course
3-8 hr sessions
30 max Participants
This workshop is companies, organizations and festivals who want a deep dive into their professional environment.
DESCRIPTION
The goal of this workshop is to work with your leadership and staff to evaluate your space, your policies and practices to see if they meet the ADA and go beyond to contradict ableism in your business. This will start with an audit, include interviews, and conclude with recommendations and training.
PART 1: Building Basic Materials: Meet to decide scope of Evaluation
Introduction to what the process and why we are doing it
Context: Local history of ableism
National laws
PART 2: Evaluation/Audit
Physical space
Review written policies and practices
Conduct interviews with staff on both written and unwritten policies and practices (these interviews are not mandatory and individual responses will be kept private so people can talk safely)
Review website, social media and other marketing to see how you represent and integrate the lived experience of people with disabilities
Observe, hang out, get to know the culture of the space
PART 3: Recommendations
Meet with leadership and give verbal feedback, decide together what will be written
Offer training options
PART 4: Training
Train leadership
Train staff
KEY TAKEAWAYS
A perspective and understanding of the big picture of ableism in a location
How ableism effects participants as an individual
Concrete steps of how to change the space, policies and practices that go beyond the ADA and are a love letter to the body.