Impact Arts

Young people between the ages of 14 and 17 from various schools across the East End of Glasgow have been coming together to engage with their environment through researching and producing nature-inspired artworks.

Part of our Creative Pathways: Environmental Design programme funded by Our Bright Future, the young people participating have been encouraged to raise awareness of the importance of preserving green spaces in their area. Through their own ideas and creativity, they have been learning that giving something back to the local community makes a big difference to the area and other residents.

The group looked at mandala designs – a spiritual symbol in Indian religions – and made their own repeat patterns and intricate designs. As well as drawing and painting their patterns on templates, they took a different approach and collected their own natural material, such as leaves and twigs, from Alexandra Park. Using these, they worked together on a bigger piece, and the final product looked amazing!

Building on their creative skills, the group have also been getting involved in creating abstract pieces on the run up to a showcase on the 7^th of December at the Briggait. They were inspired by sketching outdoors and game-based shape creation workshops. They combined the shapes they made to produce a large work combining colours and patterns.

Colour has been a central theme in their visual research. The group collected colour palettes from nature and looked at complementary colours on the colour wheel. These works will be scale models used for plywood sculptures to be presented at the showcase and will ultimately be installed in the garden at Bridgeton Community Centre.

While designing these sculptures, the group have also been getting into gardening. The young people produced their own video giving detailed insight on how to grow garlic, and also planted and harvested their own that was later made into garlic bread! This will also be presented at the showcase, where the young people will be able to show off their skills and knowledge about planting.

The group have enjoyed using photographs they have taken of nature as inspiration for their paintings and getting involved in clay workshops, where clay is pressed against various textures (e.g. trees) to produce unique patterns.

For now the group is working hard on developing finished pieces for the exhibition and we look forward to showing everyone the work on December 7^th!