YAG Recruitment Day, Saturday 19 October 2013

In our last meeting, the Youth Advisors welcomed new people to join the Group. We started the day by decorating the Briefing Space to make it more welcoming, and set up the Group Space for games.

Youth Advisors

Isobel with the amazingly decorated background in the Briefing Space

YAG Workshop, Saturday 28 September 2013

Today we tried out some new games to see what could work for the Recruitment Day we are having in October. We started with Fast Friends, where we each wrote a question on a piece of paper and then all got in pairs and Shauna read out a question for us to discuss for a minute, such as what are you hoping to get for Christmas, or what kind of animal would you like to be?

YAG Workshop, Saturday 07 September 2013

Today we welcomed new members to Youth Advisory Group from Threads Summer School. Summer School student, Posola shares what happened...

At the end of the Threads Summer School, all the participants were invited to join the Youth Advisory Group held at the National Maritime Museum. I went to my first YAG session today and learnt a bit of what being a Youth Advisor is all about. Shortly after, we devoured some pizzas then headed off to the Visions of the Universe exhibition (we got to go in for free!) where I spent the next couple of hours marvelling at the beautiful photographs of our Universe. I'll be coming back for the next session ready to plan some activities for Recruitment Day :)

Youth Advisors with certificates for designing and leading workshops in August

Youth Advisors with their tickets for Visions of the Universe

YAG Workshop, Sunday 11 August 2013

Today was the final practice before the Youth Advisors' first workshop for summer school students on Tuesday! They will teach half the students how to make Adinkra fabric using the block printing technique they have developed, and the other half how to make Dutch Wax inspired fabric using the wax resist technique they've have been practicing, using melted crayons and paint.

The Youth Advisors practiced the Dutch Wax as there are lots of steps to remember.

 

YAG Workshop,Monday 05 and Tuesday 06 August 2013

In these workshops, the Youth Advisors practiced their Dutch Wax workshop for their summer programmes. They ran through the whole thing start to finish. They taught Formal Learning officer Lucie Trottman what to do and were amazing! They also planned out all their workshops, including the roles, the timings and thinking about health & safety with the Museum's Health & Safety Advisor Karen Haden. We then met with Steve Martin, who is curating this year's International Slavery Remembrance Day commemoration at National Maritime Museum. The Youth Advisors are running a workshop for young people, so it is important they understand the history and what else is happening on the day.

We learnt a new game today - Fishes!



Planning with Anisa

Setting up the room for the workshop

YAG Workshop, Thursday 25 July 2013

Today the Youth Advisors worked with artist Seiwa Cunningham to plan for their own workshops. They will be running a workshop for summer school students in August and also a public workshop for International Slavery Remembrance Day on Friday 23 August. They will share two of the creative techniques they have learnt and the history of the textiles they are inspired by.

We began the day by thinking about how the workshops would happen - where will they be? Why are we doing it? Who is our audience? What do we need to do to prepare? We had a group discussion

YAG Workshop, Sunday 07 July 2013

In today's workshop, the Youth Advisors worked with artist Seiwa Cunningham to learn more about Adinkra fabrics. Adinkra is traditionally worn at funerals and commemorations in Ghana. There are hundreds of symbols all with different meanings referring to stories. The Youth Advisors learnt about the history of the fabric as well as how to make their own.

Seiwa showed us some fabric and some of the stamps, which are carved from gourd (a bit like a butternut squash!). The Youth Advisors made their own non-vegetable stamps from foam!

Seiwa showing the Youth Advisors the fabric we would be recreating

The Youth Advisors then introduced themselves and their names, as we would see if there was an Adinkra symbol that related to our names.

Isobel, Jennifer, Nicole and Adrian sharing the meaning of their names

Adinkra fabric and some of Seiwa's artwork

YAG Workshop, Saturday 08 June 2013

Today the Youth Advisors worked with artist Rose Sinclair to learn about Ndebele art, originating in South Africa and Zimbabwe and often used for painting houses. The Youth Advisors will be learning about different types of African textile art over the next few weeks to run their own workshops in the summer holidays.

Firstly the Youth Advisors made their own sketchbooks...

Isobel and Rachel making books

Rose teaching the Youth Advisors how to fold the book

Rose introduced the Youth Advisors to visual language and colour theory.

Jennifer decorating her book

Thu decorating her book

YAG Workshop, 25 May 2013

The Youth Advisors did some bookmaking today to make photo diaries of some recent workshops. Shauna taught them how to make an accordion book, using paper with Dutch Wax and Adinkra fabrics printed on. Lucas shares his highlight of the workshop:

'The best part was making the books, because they turned out rather professional'

YAG Workshop with Jean Campbell, Thursday 04 April 2013

Today the Youth Advisors did a workshop with Jean Campbell, learning about cultural continuity and the Transatlantic Slave Trade. The day started with a group game to share our name origin with each other. we learnt that enslaved people would often have their names changed and these cultural indicators, carefully chosen by our families, were lost

 

We then started to note anything we know about the Transatlantic Slave Trade, one piece of information on each card

YAG Workshop, Tuesday 02 April 2013

Today the Youth Advisors met with Amy Miller, Curator of Decorative Arts & Material Culture, Research & Curatorial at Royal Museums Greenwich, and Louise Simkiss, Adult Learning Manager. Joan and Piarve tell us about what they got up to...

Meeting in the Queen's House with Amy Miller

  

 

Amy and Louise talked to us about the Alice Kettle Garden of England exhibition inspired by the flamboyant Tudor and Stuart eras and then we moved on to the National Maritime Museum to see the extraordinary Yinka Shonibare's 'Nelson's Ship in a Bottle' which is inspired by Nelson's flagship Victory and Batik textiles ad well as European history and African culture. I found exploring different materials and different techniques to create materials interesting. Understanding how different cultures wore fabrics and interpreted colours was interesting. We also got an introduction to the Silver Arts Award.

Reviews of Alice Kettle's The Garden of England (in the Queen's House until 18 August 2013)

Mercedes Thompson

 

Alice Kettle’s ‘The Garden of England’ is an exhibition in The Queen’s House, taking inspiration from the historical figures around Greenwich.  The first part of the exhibition I went to see was the ‘Flower Helix’ on the Tulip Staircase.  I learnt that the artist was not Kettle alone, but also her students, who had helped to create the beautiful flowers for this wonderful piece. I also visited ‘The Flower Bed’, an installation made of synthetic fabrics with the exception of wool, due to the fabric-eating insects beneath the floorboards.  I really liked this piece because the colours were rather vibrant; I also thought that Kettle’s idea of incorporating patterns from the clothing of royal figures, such as Elizabeth I, was quite unique.  The last piece I saw was a stitch of ‘Queen Henrietta Maria’, which I found amazing as it had a lot of texture and a broad range of colours.  The exhibition was excellent, and I appreciated that Kettle and her students had made a variety of different flowers for the visitor to take away as a souvenir.

My review will be shared through the blog, and I thoroughly enjoyed sharing my experience of this exhibition through writing this review.  The evidence I have for my attendance at this event will be in the form of photos.

Meet the Museum, Tuesday 19 February 2013

Today the Youth Advisors had the opportunity to come and meet National Maritime Museum staff and find out more about what they do, how they got their roles here and what their experience and education was before. Youth Advisor Piarve tells us more...

MEET THE MUSEUM 2013 

The future is unexpected and you just never know where life will take you. One thing which has been constantly stressful to hear is 'think about your career' and 'what do you want to be', and as a young person the answer can sometimes be 'I don't know' or I am very interested in so and so but I don't think there are any jobs in it.

Today I met a wide range of people and careers which I did not imagine existed. I met a graphics designer who did graphic design from university level, graphic design as a first job and is now the graphics designer at the national maritime, but also met a lady, who did an African and Asia literature degree, started her career in media and did some journalism, yet has ended up working as a learning officer at the national maritime (what a mix of skills!). I also met a photographer who despite not attending uni, built a strong portfolio of work, did some freelancing and is now a full time photographer at the museum.

 

Louise Simkiss, Adult Learning Manager

I was amazed at how many jobs were available, from events management, to filming director to organic conservator and each individual showed true passion in their jobs.

The highlight of the day was being able to actually see 'behind the scenes' of a museum, which was nothing as I expected and I learnt that many personalities and talents are needed to form a museum. I also loved the drive, passion and ambition carried by the director as he took time from he's what seemed chaotic schedule to spend some time giving us an insight of he's role but also he's appreciation for the YAG.

I enjoyed the paper conservation part, I found it interesting how we can connect so many old pieces of history together in order to form a story. It also reminded me of the hard work and dedication it takes to unravel history. Elizabeth the paper conservative found the mixture of art and science in one job amazing.

Overall it was a good day and gave me some confidence about the future. I took away that: Whatever I do, I will still find a job which makes the best of me.

 

And Youth Advisors Terri and Tianna tell us their experience...

Today was very interesting and help us youth advisors develop our knowledge on what Jobs were actually like in the museum and it also helped us to think about whether in the future we may want to pursue a career in a museum department. Today was overall very and we hope to continue with days like this in the future round about every other month. Here's what we got up to....