Resource for Goshka Macuga, Chase Lane Primary School
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Resource for Goshka Macuga, Chase Lane Primary School Oak (2010) Goshka Macuga (born 1967) Responding to the artwork If possible, explore the artwork with students first before reading the written information. Warm up What is the youngest thing you can think of? (answers might include babies, a flower that has just opened, a new idea…) What is the oldest thing you can think of? Who is the oldest person you can think of? What is the oldest thing you own? Create a timeline running from ‘now’ to the oldest thing. Invite children to place their answers along the timeline from youngest to oldest. Now, looking at the artwork: What are we looking at? How many different parts are there? What are the different parts made of, do we think? If we touched them, what do we think they would feel like? What do the different parts remind us of? How old do you think the different parts are? Can you see any patterns? Describe them: what do they remind us of? What about the wooden base (plinth): What tree do we think it is made from? How old do we think it is? Where might it have come from? What about the clear (Perspex) box? Here is some information about the different parts of the artwork: The Orthoceras fossil (the polished slab base) is more than 500 million years old and is from Africa (Erfoud in the south of Maroc). Baculites (the pointed fossil resting upon Orthoceras) is over 80 million years old and is from America (the Pierre Shale in Dakota). The wooden base was once used to display a sculpture by an artist called Barbara Hepworth in a London Museum, Tate Britain, in 2007. Barbara Hepworth was famous for making sculptures with holes in. Imagine the two fossils and the wooden base could all talk. Give them names. Think about what they most want and what they are frightened of, and who they care about. What would they sound like? Who would be the bossiest? Who would be the most sensible? Now invite a volunteer take the ‘hot seat’ as one of the 3 things. Ask them some questions. Add more volunteers until you have all 3. Give them a situation to improvise: perhaps they have to decide what to get for breakfast, or they are waiting for a bus. Make up some more situations. Literacy Things hidden inside things This writing prompt will challenge problem solving skills, and give imaginations a work out. It also provides a structure, which is often helpful in generating creative writing. Once you have looked, and thought about, and talked about the two fossils, try this game - Take the letters that make up the fossil names: ‘O R T H O C E R A S’ and ‘B A C U L I T E S’ and the extinct sea creature ‘CEPHALOPOD’ What other words can you find in each of these words? It sometimes helps to write the letters in a circle. (Hint: there are sites for this - eg. https://www.thewordfinder.com - and you may want to print out all the available words in advance - but it is recommended that children have a look first to see what they can find independently. For example, here are some of the words contained inside CEPHALOPOD - poached, chapel, place, cheap, pale, cold, laced, ache, cola, dahl, each, echo, help, hope, ape, oh Write a group poem about the fossils using as many of the words from this search as possible. Activities using boxes Old boxes are a fantastic resource. The can be used for keeping things in, or they can be decorated and become works of art. If you can’t find the right box for your purposes, you can make one out of old card. Early Years - KS1 STORYTELLING Imagination shoeboxes Old shoeboxes filled with a selection of objects can be an excellent basis for story making. Provide a range of handling objects in each - a mixture of things that feel nice, something that looks old, something that might have been practical and something that is natural. 6 is ideal. Creating a display of precious objects “Take an object / Do something to it / Do something else to it. [Repeat.]” Jasper Johns 1964 Assemblage is a French word meaning ‘assebled’ or ‘gathered together’ In art, assemblage is the creation of sculpture through collection and unification of a variety of items that bear no relation, or the piece of art that is created as a result of this process. Assemblage uses ‘found objects’, such as bits of fabric, pebbles, bits of broken ceramics, toys, jewellery, marbles, cut out pictures, old stamps, etc. It is the last word in making something out of nothing, or recycling. This three-dimensional way of being creative has been used by artists throughout history, including famous artists such as Pablo Picasso and Betye Saar and, probably most famously in the early Twentieth Century, by Joseph Cornell. Plan a trip to ‘God’s Own Junkyard’ for inspiration. Sticking small boxes stuck together to create compartments provides a wonderful basis for displaying tiny treasures. Old matchboxes are ideal, or you can recycle old greetings cards Link: https://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=MAKING+A+BOX+FOLDING+CARD&ie=UTF- 8&oe=UTF-8#kpvalbx=1 KS2 Creating your own Cornell-inspired box Each child works on their own box to decorate and display objects as a longer project. Explore the work of Joseph Cornell for inspiration. (Working with hands, concept of working in 3D, using a variety of materials, interpreting a theme independently.) Link to RA activity: https://www.royalacademy.org.uk/article/how-to-make-a-box-like-cornell Betye Saar "I'm the kind of person who recycles materials but I also recycle emotions and feelings." Medium: Assemblage Style: Recycled sorcery Birthday: 1926 Superpower: Saar, who didn't become an artist until the age of 46, creates hypnotic assemblages that incorporate "black collectibles" and other found materials referencing the spiritual and technological, serving as a force of creative resistance for women and African Americans and a tribute to Saar's textured heritage (African, Native American, Irish and Creole.) Cross curricular activities Take a look at a map: Where are we? Can you find London? Now can you find the places these two fossils come from? Erfoud is an oasis town in the Sahara Desert. The Pierre Shale is a geologic formation east of the Rocky Mountains in the Great Plains, from Pembina Valley in Canada to New Mexico. History Draw a geologic timeline A geologic timeline combines time and stratigraphy (the dirt/rock layers in the earth) to track the entire history of Earth. Draw a geologic timeline and label each eon, era, and period. Link: https://www.fossils-facts-and-finds.com (Bonus points if you draw the creatures that lived in each time!) Link: geologic timeline explainer film 4 minutes https://youtu.be/A7Cxl7zi7fc Ribbon timeline (Image provided below.) Source: http://homeschoolden.com/2014/10/21/earth-science-earths-geologic-timeline/ Create a ribbon timeline that represents the relative lengths of historic time in equivalent lengths of different coloured ribbon. For example - red for the Hadean Eon (a time of flaming gasses, volcanoes, etc.) — 9ft 4 inches sage green for the Archaean Eon (a time of great rains, poisonous oceans) — 17 feet 4 inches yellow for the Proterozoic Eon (a time when cyanobacteria and the sun worked together to put oxygen into the atmosphere) — 26 feet blue for the Paleozoic Era (a time when most life lived in the seas to protect it from harmful rays of the sun) — 3 feet 9 inches gold for the Mesozoic Era (a time of the great reptiles, among other life) — 2 feet 5 inches green for the Cenozoic Era (a time with plants, animals birds, humans) — 10 inches Geologic Timeline Game: “What Came First?” Create index cards that include - bacteria green algae jellyfish trilobites sharks spiders ferns the first mammals the first birds ants Triceratops camel grass Invite children to try to put them into the correct order. About the artist Ten facts about Goshka Macuga She was born in Poland, but has lived in England since 1989. When she was a child, she wanted to be a dancer. She said ‘I make things, but I also borrow things.’ She studied at two important art schools in London: Central St Martin’s, and Goldsmiths College. She makes art in many different ways - including sculpture, photography, textiles and video. She shows her work in exhibitions around the world, and in 2008 was nominated for an important prize, the Turner Prize. She does not enjoy giving her work titles; she said ‘the magic is the unknown.’ Sometimes she will research in an ‘archive’, exploring the things that artists leave behind, like letters. Sometimes she will explore the forest for ideas, bringing back things she has found to include in her work. Once she dragged a huge piece of wood back from the forest to her studio on public transport, and had many interesting conversations with curious passengers on her journey. Links TateShots https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYtIk-8SmwU 2008 Turner Prize https://www.tate.org.uk/context-comment/video/goshka-macuga-turner-prize-2008 ‘Do androids dream of aesthetic creep? Hail the robots of post-human art’ Guardian article https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog+sculpture?page=2 Famous oak trees The Big Oak, by Gustave Courbet (1843). The Emancipation Oak is designated one of the 10 Great Trees of the World by the National Geographic Society and is part of the National Historic Landmark district of Hampton University.