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GLITTERBIRD - ART FOR CHILDREN UNDER THREE
Welcome
We are happy to welcome all of you. We are happy to see that so many people with different backgrounds are here to participate in this seminar that is a starting point for the project “Glitterbird – Art for the very young”. But we are even happier to see that so many people are concerned with art for children under three.
Creating and presenting art for infants and toddlers has been, and still is, controversial. When we talk about Klangfugl and Glitterbird, many people are sceptic. Some of them seem to think that they have misunderstood, because they say: Under three? You mean under three? Under three?
The background for Glitterbird
The idea of Glitterbird is based on the positive experiences from the Norwegian project "Klangfugl – art for the very young” (Os 2000, Os 2004).
Klangfugl was initiated and financed by the Arts Council Norway and we have been working with the project for almost five years. In Klangfugl 21 artistic groups were involved. They took the great challenge to meet a group of audience they did not know much about. This is an audience that might give unexpected responses during performances or exhibitions (Hernes & Os 2000, Hernes, Horn & Reistad 1993). The young audience is not disciplined, and they often express their affiliation or their rejection through bodily movements and sounds, often quite loud.
But thanks to the humbleness and respect the artists met their young audience with; we all had some really good experiences during performances and exhibitions. Many of the artists said that they had never been so nervous earlier. I think this was a token of deep respect for the children (Os 2004). Afterwards the artists expressed that they were impressed by their young audience.
The children met the artists with openness, concentration and enthusiasm. Through the artists’ dedication to their work, they have contributed to gain experiences about presenting art for children under three and they have given a lot of children and their caregivers some really valuable art-experiences. They also have contributed to change the attitude towards children between zero and three.
During the seminar you will have the opportunity see three of the artistic results of the artists’ work: “Typer og Ting (Types and Tings)” performed by Petruskja Theatre, “Bussen (The Bus)” by Bibbi Winberg, and “Fugl (Bird)” performed by Agnes Buen Garnås and Ruth Wilhelmine Meyer. We are sorry we cannot show you all the artist’s work that were created during the Klangfugl - period.
Glitterbird
Glitterbird is an international project involving Finland, Denmark, France/Italy, Hungary and Norway. Glitterbird is supported by the EU-program “Culture 2000”. The project started in November 2003 and will end in November 2006. During the project period about 15 artist-groups in the participating countries will get support to create and present art for children under 3.
The aim of Glitterbird
The aim of Glitterbird is to give children under the age of 3 opportunities to meet and experience art. This is the most important aim of the project. But another important intention with Glitterbird, is to spread the idea that children under three are able to meet and enjoy art. We want people in different parts of Europe to realise that art also should be a part of small children’s life. And we want to stimulate even more artists to create art for small children.
CHALLENGES in the PROJECT
The main aim for the Klangfugl project was to look close into what is genuine for this age group when it comes to art. We think this still is one of our main concerns in the Glitterbird project.
We need both experts on toddlers, brain-researchers, experts on different forms of art and most of all artists to contribute to this knowledge. Any knowledge that could inspire and guide the interested artist, art production and art meetings is valuable in this project.
We learned from the Klangfugl project that any experience from the different art-projects is essential to communicate to everyone involved in the main project.
One of the reasons why we have art is: “We have art because we want to experience how many ways something can be said.” In the long run, this creates tolerance. And in that sense we want to challenge our own preconceptions of what is good art for children under three years of age. We have to make all knowledge beneficial for everyone in the project and we have to make this knowledge known for further art productions and to new artists who want to make art for this age group. In this work the artists that contributed in the Klangfugl project is a great resource.
About the artist!
• It is important for the artist to trust his or hers artistic integrity. This is an important quality and communicates a honesty to any audience.
• It is important for the artist to see knowledge about children as an inspiration for the artistic work.
• We have to see that considerations dealing with this age group do not prevent the artist to develop good art.
Why art for children under three?
Even if our Klangfugl- artists were dedicated to the task of creating and presenting art for children under three, artists outside the project often are quite sceptic to the idea. They do not think it is possible to make “real” art when the art is adapted to small children. Maybe you have to experience small children in performances or exhibitions yourselves, to realise that art and children under three are not incompatible.
We once met an artist who had been making art for older children during the last 20 years. He said that it was not possible to present art for infants and toddlers. After having seen some of the artistic works of Klangfugl, he came back to us, and said that he had changed his mind.
But of course, we also meet persons that immediately are positive to the idea. For example the Indian theatre director we met some days ago. He immediately asked: “Have you considered doing something like this in India?” Well – we have not – until now …
But why shall children under three have opportunities to meet and experience art? This Indian theatre director was quite clear about his reasons. He said that poor families in India often give high priority to commercial activities for children like television and computer-games even if they hardly have money for food. These children experience a double poverty, both a material and a cultural poverty. Maybe art can give children other experiences than they get in front of TV and computer-games - not only in India. We are familiar with the same phenomena in our society too. The commercial word is trying to reach younger and younger audiences.
What is art for this age group?
• What is art for this age group? Is any activity put before a child that holds the child’s attention art? And what are the criteria we have to use in order to say that this is art of high quality for this age group? A subject for continuous discussion, which might inspire the artist to go into a dialogue with the target group.
• Art is supposed to contain reminiscences of the past – so what is past for this age group. It has just started out on his or her way in life. Any piece of art exists in time and space. That gives any piece of art possibilities to treat time and space in a way that makes our children experience time. Time is all to do about past and present and future.
• Art is supposed to destabilise – what is it going to destabilise for this age group? When is the child confident enough to be able to undertake challenges? This is as well a vital challenge to the artist. His or her ability to communicate with the child makes this aspect of art more or less successful.
• This age group does not know the conventions of the different forms of art. This is a common preconception that we want to challenge. The question is; do we have something to learn from this age group, which in time will contribute to change the arts? We see how knowledge i.e. about metafictionality has made changes in many theatre forms that we see today. (Metafictionality in theatre is a combination of different principles of dramaturgy that one might also find in children’s dramatic play.)
• What is it then that children shall recognise or identify in the theatre, in visual art, in the dance?? We know that movements, rhythms, shapes, light and darkness, sounds, words, well composed and well phrased movement and sound/sentence and I especially want to stress relationships and emotions i.e. are elements that a child can see/hear or recognise. That means any human activity is recognisable to the child and a source for the arts.
• Is theatre/dance a language/ text / that is recognisable to the toddlers, and what is it that they might recognise? Is the human species inbred with conventions of the performative arts? And is the movement given en aesthetic form something that we can convey an understandable message through – and what is it with these languages that communicate good or bad.
Art is about finding the right means to communicate a chosen message. In order to do this we create symbols – to make the communication easier. We simplify. It is difficult to make a brilliant work of art simple enough. Is the art simplified in the right way? Or do we underestimate the infant? Do we make art for small children complex enough? We know the infants are able to take in quite complex forms and rhythms. This should inspire us to develop our form of art –especially when we make art for children under three.
There are different approaches to art and small children and different approaches often depend on different views of the relationship between children and the world. A quite well-known approach is to think that children should meet art because they can learn something about art or because we want them to learn how to perform art.
An instrumentalistic thought like this is often combined with an objectification of both children and art. Art is used as an object for education and children are viewed as objects that are possible to form into predetermined patterns. The motivation for initiating activities for children is often instrumentalistic. It is a way to legitimate that we spend money on children.
The intention with Glitterbird is not to be part in an instrumentalistic movement. It has not been our purpose to use art as an instrument for promoting children's development. Glitterbird will focus on the meeting-points between art and small children. Does this mean that we are totally ignorant about whether children will benefit or not from the project? No, it does not. Of course, we are aware that children are learning all the time from all their experiences, but this fact is not a part of the legitimisation of Glitterbird. We do not want to be specific about how children are going to benefit from art experiences. And – it is simply not under our control.
We have to deal with the fact that some events of life might be valuable even if it is not possible to constrain them to obtain specific instrumental intentions. The opportunity to meet art is important for its own sake- just as playing, being together with friends, swimming, singing hopefully are activities we sometimes participate in without specific learning-objectives.
The choice of art for infants and toddlers is a choice based on values. We choose to give children opportunity to take part in something we think is valuable. And we hope and believe that children will benefit from these experiences - in their own way, but we have no guaranties for the result. In fact – that is the essential point in dealing with children.
Hopefully we are not thinking of changing the child into something we like to see. We have to see the child as it is, as a human being that can experience art in its own way, and get respect for that.
Children are active and participate
In an instrumentalistic approach to art and children, there is an inherent assumption about the passive child. But the attitude towards infants and toddlers are changing. During the last 30 to 40 years, research has revealed that infants and toddlers are competent individuals that from birth are able to take part in social relationships (Smith & Ulvund 1999, Stern 1985, Schaffer 1984). They have communication skills on a high level (see Murray & Trevarthen 1985) which means that they are able to communicate with artists and art.
The Danish researcher Illeris has developed an alternative to an instrumentalistic approach to children’s meetings with art. She calls it a relational model. In this model meetings between art and children are seen as meetings between subjects in a special context. Both parts contribute, also children, and the relationship is considered mutual. Danbolt and Enerstvedt (1995) are talking about cultural meetings.
But even if small children are contributing to art experiences, it is important to be aware that the relationship between adults and children are asymmetric which means that they are not equal when it comes to power and control. According to the Norwegian researcher Berit Bae (1996), adults have the power to define the relationship. Adults for example, have the power to define the qualities of the relations. They also decide what is possible to do or not do in certain settings.
Experiences from Klangfugl show that even small children are very sensitive to expectations in different situations. Before we started the project we anticipated that the infants and toddlers would be quite wild in an unpredictable way. We experienced that even if small children might surprise us, they also have a great ability to “read” the situation, and behave as expected.
It is important to keep focus on the target group in every aspect of the Glitterbird project. The target group should set the premises for what kind of art is going to be made and presented through the 3 next years. We all know that it is a challenge to make art deliberately for the infants and the toddlers – The child cannot defend themselves. They have to accept what we as adults present for them. They can hardly walk out the door if they do not like what they see. It has to do about ethics and it has to do about artistic integrity.
This means that the artists have a great responsibility towards the children, especially since the artists are at their home ground, while most of the children are meeting art for the first time. It is a great challenge for the artists to take care of two-year old children that come into the theatre, look at you and say with a confident smile: We are going to the theatre ..” when you know that they do not know what it implies … because this is their first visit to the theatre …
The visual artist Marcel Duchamp made possible what new art could be and by that changed our understanding of art. He gave the onlooker a special status. The concept and the context of the art object is as important as the art object. He said: “It is the onlooker that fulfils the piece of art.” This gives the artist a responsibility to make the art accessible to the very young both in a physical and a mental way.
The composer John Cage said: “Things are more important when it is not expressed by the artist but expressed by the onlooker.” This is an invitation to see the responses from the child as a kind of dialogical approach to art. Children make sounds; children make movements in a response to and as a comment to the presentation in a dance like dialogue with the performer. And a dialogue goes two ways. The performer has to go into dialogue with the child.
A dancer formulated this communication: “It is like having a zipper attached to the front of your body. And as the performance advance you as a performer have to move this zipper up and down in a continuous flowing movement in accordance with how the audience is responding and taking part in the performance.”
The choreographer Merce Cunningham approved the “space” in-between the artist and the child. He opened up for the potential space. He said: “Between the performer and the audience something emerges that I could not have planned.” He claims that an open symbol has a potential to convey meanings far beyond mans capacity. This shows a respect for and a humble attitude to the audience as an experiencing body of individualists/subjects that are able to experience and construct their own and unique relation to the piece of art. I think this is an important attitude towards the audience that consist of children of the age 0-3. It is important to keep the idea of innocence, of openness and freshness, by keeping a childlike clarity in ones way of making and understanding art.
Litterature:
Bae, B. (1996): Voksnes definisjonsmakt og barns selvopplevelse. I: Det interessante i det alminnelige – en artikkelsamling. Pedagogisk Forum. Oslo.
Danbolt, G. & Enerstvedt, Å. (1995): Når voksenkultur og barns kultur møtes. Rapport nr. 2. Norsk kulturråd. Oslo.
Hernes L. & Os, E. (2000): Klangfugl - kulturformidling med de minste. I: Arnesen, C.: Barndom i bevegelse. Norsk folkemuseum. Norsk kulturråd. Oslo.
Hernes L., Horn, G. & Reistad H. (1993): Teater for barn. Tell forlag. Vollen.
Illeris, H (2004): Med fascination som drivkraft. Relasjonelle møder mellom børn og kunstværker. Kunstformidling til Børn. Temanummer.Sekretariat for Børnekulturnetværk. http://www.sebnet.dk/Temanummer%20om%20kunstformidling.htm
Kaye, K. (1982): The Mental and Social Life of Babies: How Parents Create Persons. Harvester Press. Brighton.
Murray L. & Trevarthen C. (1985): Emotional Regulation of Interactions Between Two-months-old and Their Mothers. I: Field, T.M. & Fox, N. (red.): Social Perceptions in Infants.Noorwood. Ablex.
Os, E. (2000): Klangfugl – kulturformidling med de minste. Arbeidsnotat nr. 36. Norsk kulturråd. Oslo.
Os, E. (2004): Under tre år? Mener dere under tre? Under tre? Klangfugl – kunst for de minste. Rapport fra et prosjekt som beveger seg under den kulturelle lavalder. HiO-rapport nr.6.
Schaffer, H.R. (1984): The Child's Entry into a Social World. Academic Press. London.
Smith, L. & Ulvund, S.E. (1999): Spedbarnsalderen. Universitetsforlaget. Oslo.
Stern, D.N. (1985): The Interpersonal World of the Infant. Basic Books. New York.
[1] metafiction (n)
1. fiction that emphasizes the nature of fiction, the techniques and conventions used to write it, and the role of the author
2. a work of metafiction
[2]performative (adj)
used to describe speech that constitutes an act of some kind, for example, the phrase “I promise I’ll do my best,” that constitutes a promise in itself
a performative utterance (n)
Encarta® World English Dictionary © 1999 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. Developed for Microsoft by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc.
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