The Sister Cities Commission 2024 Project, “Mapping and Art: Teaching the Geography of the Sister Cities through Art,” brings the Charlottesville community closer TOGETHER with our sister cities, Besançon, France, Poggio a Caiano, Italy, Winneba, Ghana, and Huehuetenango, Guatemala. We will be offering walk-in Mapping and Art workshops for the Tom Tom Festival, where festival participants can make an installation together that maps out Charlottesville’s connections to the Sister Cities using drawings, photographs, writing, string, clothesline, recipes, the languages of the Sister Cities, and mementos. The installation and its maker’s spaces will take up an entire room and will be a 3-D representation of relationships that we make TOGETHER. Printed materials, such as street maps, bilingual dictionaries, and guide books, will also be used. The clothesline forms are inspired by Somé Louis, an artist and dancer who uses string, movement, sticks, and clothesline to map places and reactions to landscapes. Louis is one of the designated workshop leaders for the project’s inclusion in area schools.
Participants will begin by making a hand-drawn map of the world using only their memories. Afterwards, we will see what we have added or omitted, discussing the map of the world we hold within us. Next, we will experience forming collages out of photographs, a sister city artform by photographer Stacey Evans. Evans worked with students in Besançon and in Charlottesville to produce merged views of the two cities.
From there, participants will make sketches, taking a walk out by the Rivanna River. Upon return, they will add to the art installation, using resources and materials provided. The result will be a 3-D representation we can walk under and over, and collages we can assemble and reconfigure.
All ages are welcome.
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