I am an artist, educator, loving, transformationist

I've been taking this extraordinary e-course with Kelly Rae Roberts and reading Maya Gonzalez's Claiming Face curriculum which provides an alternative pedagogy for teachers to engage students in learning through creativity and claiming their authentic selves (Kelly also does this in a very different way). So, here goes....

The animals are from my personal symbolic non-hierarchical totemic taxonomy (whew! Taxonomy is a cool word for a system of classifying). My animals are not in any particular order, but they do mean specific things. Beginning at the bottom - the snake is a symbol of transformation because it sheds it's kin, the turtle tells me to slow down and that I carry "home" wherever I go, crocodiles and alligators are ancient survivors and can live both on land and in the water - they also remind me that I need to have a thicker skin at times, elephants with their trunks up signify good luck - they live in herds (community) are very soulful, and also have thick skins. Birds represent flight, the imagination, fragility and the world of ideas, and a mouse with an elephant represent the Indian God Ganesh - "the lord of obstacles" because together they can go absolutely anywhere."  Finally, butterflies are the ultimate symbol of transformation emerging from their cocoons as caterpillars before shedding their caterpillar selves to be a glorious butterfly.

I am more in love with the concept of this painting, which is part homage to Mati Rose, part homage to Native American totem poles and partly based on the creation myth of turtles on top of turtles, than the image itself. The actual painting doesn't include the collaged word elements but I feel my background makes it too busy. I will simplify later.  But here I am, impatient to post, and here it is - imperfect but present. Hope you enjoy.

A tale of a mouse, snail, and hamster and other workshop stories

No-one had signed up for a class I was teaching on felting totem animals. Perhaps it was the long weekend, perhaps it was that people here don't really know how wonderful felting is, perhaps it's Sacramento, or time, or the economy. So, I thought I was going to cancel it, which was also OK, when I got an email from 12 year old Julia saying she and her friend wanted to come. I was impressed by her initiative and that she really wanted to take the class. Plus there's something so magical about teaching friends and Julia's mum ended up coming too, which made it even more special. We talked a little about totem animals and they each chose an animal. I had them write some qualities that they either felt their animals had or that they themselves wanted. Interestingly, most of the qualities that they wrote were qualities that they already had themselves. Julia ~ Mouse: shy, intelligent, resourceful. Nina ~ Rabbit: curious, playful, cuddly, loveable. Anne ~ Cat: fun, athletic, lazy (which Anne loves to be when she can), independent. They all also had many other qualities such as ~ smart, amazing, and fabulous!
I showed them some of my animals, and then introduced them to the needle, the roving (wool) and its different qualities, and some techniques. We then spent 3 very focused hours together. I was very happy to be their teacher. Julia had the simplest animal, plus she was just really fast, so she ended up making her mouse, 2 snails, a hamster and a finger puppet. I was amazed at how experimental she was and delighted with the results.

Nina worked slower and more methodically, felting densely and securely to make a lovely bunny which she held tenderly.

 

 

 
Anne's was also impressive and she too had great focus. Together they made quite the menagerie.

 From left - my beginning baby abonimable sowman (not quite a totem animal) Nina's bunny (the photo doesn't do it justice), my little kitty, Anne's big kitty, Julia's 2 snails, mouse, finger puppet, and wee hamster.

Because Julia finished way before the rest of us, I asked her to write a story about her creations. She asked the name of my pig and I told her along with the story of what "treyf" means (forbidden or non-kosher). Here is her story.

One day, Piccolo the mouse, Humphrey the hamster, and Arnold the snail took a walk. They heard an odd noise coming from behind a bush. "What is it?" they cried. They had never heard anything like it before. "Help!" they heard a voice cry. They cautiously peeked around the bush. They saw a little pink pig stuck in the brush. "Oh no!" screeched Piccolo. "Please help me!" begged the pig. The threesome helped him out of the brush. The pig told them that his name was Treyf. They all became friends.

The End.

Moral: Don't play in bushes :)