by Eve-Marie Angerer
We are an art workshop in Brussels. Our goal is to inspire children for a respectful relationship of humans towards the ocean through the production of paintings for Mundus maris.
First of all, we enable children to discover the universal language of painting.
They reflect as a group on some of the issues to start with, then explore the ideas through sketchbooks and finally paint on large canvases.
These "artivistic" through the graphic expression wish to raise awareness for protecting ocean wildlife and the need to rethink our use of marine resources.
Composition of the Workshop
The Workshop is currently made up of ten young people, all girls, aged eight to 12 years, of different nationalities.
They are: Clementine and Violette (Belgium), Lisa and Louise (Germany), Elianor, Constance, Marie and Agathe (France), Sophie (Luxembourg) and Yara (Lebanon).
The workshop meets once a week during the school term under the direction of Eve-Marie Angerer, a French artist and painting teacher. Click here to see her work or search for more on Google.
Programme of our events and contributions
June-July 2011: Participation in the youth exhibition SeeArt in Hilden in Germany, through some paintings. These are five ready paintings out of a cycle of 10 oil paintings on canvas.
In preparation: an exhibition of the entire cycle in the European institutions later this year.
We would be happy to collaborate with other youth groups working with Mundus maris.
Description of the paintings sent to SeeArt Youth Exhibition:
Painting 1: This represents the blue planet and its oceans where fish evolve without suffering from pollution or overfishing. The desire of young people is to restore the environment so that the oceans can return to those days not so long past.
The painting "Origins" was done by Lisa (10 years), Elianor (11 years), Violette (9 years), Constance, Louise (10 years), Sophie and Clementine.
Painting 2: This piece represents the beauty and diversity of marine species.
On a blue-green background, the fish, shellfish, seals and whales are represented in white to symbolise their innocence.
It wants to remind us of an idyllic world free from any overfishing, pollution or other negative effects of human intervention, as in the dreams of the children and how they want us to leave nature for them to enjoy.
This painting is a group by Violette, Elianor, Louise and Constance.
Painting 3: "My earth hurts" represents a pregnant Gaia, the blue planet in her womb suffering from pollution and making her suffer too.
In this table the kids want to make us aware that our planet is as precious as a baby in the womb of her mother and that when a pregnant woman is in pain we should all be worried and do something to alleviate her suffering.
Group painting by Louise, Elianor, Violette, Sophie, Clementine and Lisa.
Painting 4: The oceans as they might become, if we do not stop the plundering of their resources: a mass of mud-colored water, so affected by bad practices and polluted by oil spills etc that fish are driven inexorably toward collapse.
Are we going to end in such a vortex and won't escape the vicious cycle? This is another group work.
Painting 5: "Protect Oceans" is a call to stop overfishing and to protect marine species in all their diversity.
This group work was created by Violette, Lisa, Alienor, Marie and Louise.
See the painting with mixed media in the exhibition itself.