Interactions - An exploration of Communicating in Relationship @APR starting 4/18/23

What kinds of things can we use to express the way we communicate with each other? Protest art is often a way of capturing strong emotions with word and image to appeal to our audience. What other ways do we have to tell others what we are feeling? What kinds of symbols and images can help us visualize the impact of our words on the world?

Example: Fire can be used to show...

- Anger

- Feeling consumed

- Passion

- Spicy Food

- Spicy Language 

Words can wake us up, shake us, allow us to release, to express, to vent, to voice or give voice to what is happening inside of us or between ourselves and others. Words can be sharp, stinging, sad, silly - we can use them to sing a song, cry for help, tell a joke. We can use a megaphone, a microphone, a cell phone - to breath fire or spit bars, sound comes out of us in the form of a story. Maybe - if we are lucky - there are people in our lives that can help us organize the tangled threads and crochet it all into a story quilt, so we can see ourselves and our lives more clearly - like a friend, a parent, a therapist, a stranger on the bus.

Ways we engage with each other: 

- Comforting

- Laughing

- Wishing

- Vomiting

- Screaming

- Singing

- Preaching

- Performing

Part 1: The Brainstorm

Pair up (or be prepared to show an exchange between 2 individuals) and begin to explore what kind of interaction each pair wants to illustrate. Today is just about focusing on how to show the nature of the exchange without words - what does it feel, taste, look like to witness or be inside of this conversation? Is it a conflict, a memory, a wish for the kind of exchange that is not available right now? Is it familiar, an exploration of how you feel most seen or heard? How do we translate that into something tangible, metaphorical?

Create a sketch for us to jump into media with during the next session - go wide and try out a bunch of different ideas before settling on the right one for you and your partner.

Initial Brainstorm

My work-in-progress/sketch

Part 2: Making the Piece

Utilizing the materials we have been exploring and maybe some of the techniques that we have practiced together, each pair will figure out what vantage point and materials most fit the quality of their individual communication styles - each person is responsible for their part of the conversation/piece, but the 2 should fit together to tell us a story about the relationship between the 2 parts.

Part 3: Finish and Critique

Questions tbd