Sunday Studio: 'It looks like Boyd Webb has travelled into space with some curtains!'

Boyd Webb, Blessed, 1985

cibachrome photograph, Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki, purchased 1986

After recapping on all the things we have learned about different ways of mapping, we headed up to the Toi Aotearoa exhibition again, this time to look at the photographic print called Blessed by Boyd Webb.

The childrens' hands flew up the moment they were seated in front of the work, each desperate to share ideas about the work! Each child had something really interesting to say about what they noticed in the work, whether by describing what they saw or by offering a suggestion as to what it could be about.

The children thought the circular form was a moon at first until closer inspection revealed a leaf pattern over the surface of the 'moon'. We talked about where you might see a pattern like that, and the children thought it looked more like fabric than the moon. Charlie L commented that 'It looks like Boyd Webb has travelled into space with some curtains!'. After some careful looking we also began to notice a few toy cars travelling around the surface of the fabric planet and the surgical gloves on the hands.

This was a great work for firing up the imagination and getting the children ready to make creative use out of the patterns and textures we documented in the Gallery the week before. Back in the studio the children were straight into the task of changing the context of the textures we photographed last week, by creating new worlds and maps by cutting and collaging.

We had a great studio course with some great ideas and explorations in the Gallery and the Studio. Catch up with us in Term 2 when we focus on Animals in Art!