Living Quilt
with Kenneth Burdett School Art Club
2021 Spring Workshops
In the spring of 2021, Living Marks partnered with Kenneth Burdett School of the Deaf in Ogden, UT for a series of workshops to create the Living Quilt project. In weekly live/digital improv sessions, KBS students joined Living Marks artists from around the country to explore co-creative spaces, intra-disciplinary artworks, and hybrid virtual/in-person communication modes. Living Quilt evolved into a deep exploration of the limits and possibilities of meaningful communication through creative acts. Using drawing, movement, sound creation, process experiments, and discussion, the group engaged with questions of togetherness, experiences in pandemic, response to change, and thoughts about the future.
“We wanted everyone to follow what they were feeling and their instincts when building this out. And build it out together. ”
Looking Forward Mural Project
The Living Quilt project culminated in the creation of a mural for the city of Ogden, in partnership with the Ogden Downtown Alliance and Nurture the Creative Mind. The final piece explores ideas related to the experience of Covid-19 and the possibilities for the future ahead. The artists and students shared their experiences and ideas related to these topics through design, painting, drawing, music, dance, photography, and discussion.
Living Quilt, by the Kenneth Burdett School of the Deaf Art Club and Living Marks. Acrylic on wood panel. 8’ x 8’. 2021.
Living Marks ensemble member Jo Blake reflecting on the Living Quilt Project.
“It reminds me of the circle of life. We are all in this together, right? And before I added some of those green circles, it felt reminiscent of being in isolation, in quarantine. Or in a prison or having barriers. And adding those circles really kind of cleared that up, provided some hope. Hope for the future is what I get when I look at it. ”
ARTWORKS
“We’ve got one thumb coming down into the circular space to represent an eye...it shows a relationship that deaf people have using their hands and their eyes to access the world.”
PARTNERS
Made possible through an Ogden City Arts Grant
Virtual Care Lab creative experiments in remote togetherness