This is our table and we bloomed in every way we could.
–Student at collage workshop in Izmir, Turkey
Attending our creative workshop might feel like taking a risk. “What are we signing up for exactly?” Most adults haven’t done collage since they were in school. Not knowing the other participants also brings uncertainty: “How shall we discuss personal reflections from the film with people we have never met before?”
As a facilitator, giving the workshop also feels like taking a risk. It truly depends on the participants to fill it with life. Because the workshop is not an art class but rather an exploration of how each of us connects to the themes of friendship, aging and inspiration in a playful, creative context.
Recently we gave the Collage Workshop after screening the film in Izmir, Turkey.
As we set up in the sunny large conference room, participants of all ages began arriving singly or in pairs. People shyly took their seats around the colorful materials spread out across the long table. With the help of translators, we began speaking about what resonated for them in Grains of Sand.
Many connected with the depth and honesty of the friendship. A few spoke about being inspired to take a retreat. Others reflected on their own life transitions so far, and how the film gave them hope for their old age.
Soon all were working, leaning across to choose a certain pattern, cutting, gluing, passing each other bits of paper or fabric as initial shyness gave way to excitement and concentration. Glasses of tea were distributed. Conversations across the table came and went without any hesitation.
Circulating, I could see the myriad of ways that people were bringing themselves into their work: a piece of a map of Finland; a sack of stones on a cut-out woman’s shoulders… and so people moved from working with impressions of the film to developing reflections about their own lives using shapes and colors on the page.
In the end when everyone shared what they had been making, I realized that this group had changed. I can’t describe it otherwise: the caring, interested way everyone listened, sometimes making a comment or asking a question, showed me that we had become a group no longer of strangers but of people who were connected.
Their comments about their collage work were moving, profound, sometimes silly, but always authentic. One student drew a picture of how she had felt about the workshop (above) and gave it to me. Another had brought artwork from home as a gift for me and my protagonists.
As we said goodbye, we posed for photographs together, shared our emails, and admired each other’s work. We saw that our risk-taking was rewarded – by the gift of an experience affirming our human connection.
