Creative Challenge 15

 
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Title:

Butterfly Dreams - making butterflies from nature

Artform:

Nature Art

Challenge:

This activity is about collecting and using leaves, petals, flowers, seed heads, twigs, berries and anything from nature to create butterflies, bugs, beetles as art.

Resources:

Natural materials found outside such as leaves, petals and flowers in a beautiful range of colours, shapes and sizes

Collect seed heads, twigs and interesting natural things you find lying on the ground or in the hedgerows.

 

Getting started:

  • Once you have collected your interesting natural things, lay them onto a blank surface. This could be on the pavement while you’re out, so long as people can get past – or back home/school on a blank piece of paper or plain table top

  • Start to lay out the bits in the shape of butterflies or bugs – you might like to look at a picture of examples in a book or on the computer to give you ideas

  • Look at all the bits you have collected, what do they remind you of? What would make good wings or antennae?

  • You can make as many as you like in all sorts of combinations, remember to take a photograph and then make another

  • You could do a time lapse video of your making process or even make a stop-frame animation making your bugs walk or fly

  • You could give them species names of your own 

  • You don’t have to keep any of the stuff you’ve collected as you have all the photos so you can put them in the compost or back outdoors where they’ll decompose 

Be careful of any prickly bits and make sure you wash your hands, after handling things

Watch the video here for how to get started: https://youtu.be/RI3I8KvuoY8

or follow the instructions in the handout here

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Find out:

Susie Walker is a Mixed Media Artist.

Find out more about Susie and her work on Instagram: @susewalk

Share:

Share your lovely patterns with friends and family or post it on social media: be sure to use the hashtag #artsawardathome #loveartsaward

Leave for other people to find outside somewhere and bring a smile to their face.

Make a calendar with your images to send to friends and family for Christmas

Make some greetings cards from your images to send to friends and family

More Challenges:

  • Can you draw your creations? Maybe use a twig dipped in ink to draw with.

  • Create patterns and mandalas with leaves, petals, seed pods and twigs.

  • Thread leaves together to create a garland to hang in your room

  • Lay leaves in a pattern in a shallow dish of water and freeze to create a see-through icey leaf pattern

  • Can you identify your leaves? 

  • Can you use twigs or pine needles to join your leaves together to make a little leaf blanket or home for a bug? Or something else.

  • You could stick your leaves to a jam jar in a pattern and put some fairy lights inside.

Other inspiration:

Land Artists who use leaves in their work including:

Andy Goldsworthy – https://www.livingyourwildcreativity.com/art-gallery-1-mitchell-1

Richard Long -http://www.richardlong.org

https://inhabitat.com/top-6-incredible-artworks-made-from-autumn-leaves/

Richard Shilling - https://www.richardshilling.co.uk

Susanna Bauer - http://www.susannabauer.com

James Brunt - http://www.jamesbruntartist.co.uk

From the States - Sally J Smith - https://sallyjsmithart.com/greenspirit-arts/environmental-sculpture/


Other Opportunities:

You can also get your work into a community exhibition at Stroud’s Museum in the Park if you send your photos to email: museum@stroud.gov.uk

Any questions:

Contact Susie Walker: susewalk@yahoo.co.uk

‘Butterfly Dreams’ was part of the Big Draw 2020 - A Climate of Change, commissioned by the Museum in the Park.

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