Weaving Cultures: Sharing Stories with Art

A study trip for Art Education students wouldn't be complete without an art project for children, so Wednesday we headed to Centro Cultural Los Nazarenos-- a cultural center that offers After School Music, Language and Art programs for children.

School is for a half day in Guatemala-- from 7 am to noon, or 2 pm to 7 pm-- so programs like the one we visited are an integral part of the community. Many families work all day and need safe, fun and educative places to send their children.

Planning an activity that extended beyond the language barrier was as rewarding as it was challenging. Our first goal was to present Art making as a universal language-- a chance to communicate without words. Our second goal was to reverse teacher/ student roles. Through art making, children would have an opportunity to teach us about Guatemala.

We selected weaving as our medium, since it is already an integral part of Guatemalan and Maya cultures. An example of traditional weavings are Huipiles-- colorful, symbolism-rich cloaks-- visual representations of the tribal communities they originate from. Casa Herrera has a variety of these gorgeous hand-woven garments hanging on the walls.

In the same manner as Huipil artisans, children used contemporary and traditional weaving materials to incorporate colors, patterns and images that represented parts of their culture. Rosa Maria, the cultural center's director, played light jazz music, and we all huddled in a tight-knit group on the floor.

Children began by creating individual weavings, and finished by incorporating personalized pieces into a large group weaving. We owe a debt of gratitude to Milady, our fearless translator. With her help, Centro Cultural children, and UT students were able to share personal art inspirations with one another.

It's been awhile since I've planned a formal art project for children, and admittedly my nerves were flaring:

"Would they have fun when communication would be so limiting?" 

I shouldn't have worried. It seems children teach more to us, than we impart to them. Between colored photograph strips, pieces of ribbon, boxes of crayons, glances, smiles, and laughs, we realized Art was a medium for something else far more meaningful than paper and string weavings.

Between halting Spanish, and the children's patient explanations ("Tortuga" said a little girl when I pointed to her turtle picture), we remembered that shared vocabulary only scratches the surface of human interaction. We were reminded that sometimes the best communication exists in the invisible space between words...  the spaces where our hearts do the talking.