Through the eyes of babes

Sculpture exhibition inspires Curious Minds

If its young students’ reactions to an art exhibition are anything to go by, it seems Curious Minds Preschool in Castlebar is living up to its name. The Linenhall Arts Centre was delighted to welcome the children and teachers from the preschool to Cathy Carman’s exhibition ‘Diary’ on January 22 and 27.
The initial visits led to follow-up work in the classroom and has since resulted in an exhibition of the children’s work in the Linenhall’s foyer area.
In the months previous to their visit to the Linenhall, the staff at the Curious Minds Pre-school in Castlebar had observed that some of the children were beginning to explore and manipulate play dough in new ways.
Their creations were becoming more complex and intentional, and they began sculpting people and animals during school time. Curious Minds teacher Ann Halligan approached the Linenhall in mid-January to see if it would be possible to bring the children to visit Carman’s exhibition, which includes many sculptures, and the arts centre – which has quite the reputation for fostering a love of art in children – said yes straight away.
During their visits to the Linenhall, the children were encouraged to respond to the sculptures through the use of open-ended questions, such as “What is going on in this sculpture?”. The answers were as individual as they were creative.
Responding to Cathy Carman’s piece ‘Waves of the Sea’, one child commented, “She is trying to climb down but her feet can’t touch the ground. She’s scared of falling.” Looking at another piece, ‘The Burden of Joy - Take Two’, another child said, “I think he’s frozen. It has a skeleton body. He looks like a stone.”
Back in school after the visit, the children reflected on the exhibition, using photographs from the trip as prompts. The children then created their own sculptures in clay in response to what they had seen in the Linenhall gallery.
While making the work, the children explained what they were doing: “This clay feels cold and hard and smooth. The sculpture in the Linenhall had a hole in his belly. My one has no hole in his belly. He’s a boy sculpture … This is very delicate work.”
The children’s creations are now on show in the Linenhall’s foyer space.
“It is just fantastic that young children in our community are engaging with our visual art exhibition programme in such an in-depth way,” said Orla Henihan, the Linenhall’s Arts Access Officer. “It was a real privilege to witness them interpreting the work, and to see the work that they created in response. Hats off to all at Curious Minds Preschool.”

Cathy Carman’s exhibition ‘Diary’ continues until Saturday, February 13 in the Linenhall Arts Centre gallery. The children’s work will also be on show at the Linenhall Arts Centre foyer until that date.