children | grunt gallery

1st Day- Amelie PLAY FALL REST DANCE

Amelie was the first and only participant to use the tall ladder.

Being an accomplished gymnast might be why she has no fear of heights.

Amelie has an extremely shy disposition yet there is a fierce strength to her.

Her style was fragile yet focused and determined.

Besides using paint she made a few deep red chalk lines with a plumb line.

At one point she looked at her hands intensely and seemed concerned.

Amelie thought they were bleeding.

I check it out and we concluded it was red chalk dust.

She looked up at the wall, smiled and whispered “The wall is bleeding.”

Amelie is termed ‘medically complex’.

‘Medically Complex’ is a term used for babies born with a rare and undefinable disorder.

Multiple life threatening illnesses will seriously affect the person in undetermined ways.

8 to 10 years ago medicine and medical procedures were not able to keep medically complex babies alive.

Amelie’s heart is severely affected as well as her white blood cell count.

She has had numerous open heart surgeries since birth and catches phenomena regularly.

Yet she has defeated doctors prognosis’s of having completely flaccid muscular structure by 8 years old.

She is 9 and ripped!

Play, Fall, Rest, Dance is an exhibition project by Valerie Salez. The artist works with children with disabilities to help them explore the creative process of installation making. The exhibition runs from June 3 to July 5, 2014. The public is welcome to visit grunt gallery to see the installations that will continuously change and evolve over the course of the project.

1st Day – Isabelle PLAY FALL REST DANCE

Isabelle was very overwhelmed with all the supplies and materials.

I asked her to quickly choose four things that she finds interesting.

She chose all things black, white, red and clear glass.

Then she got to building….

What it is, what it was to become, was irrelevant.

It was solely about colour, pattern, and construction.

And how to install in the gallery.

I introduced her to plinths.

Isabelle is a meticulous worker with a graphic aesthetic sense.

She wanted alternating black and white surfaces on the plinths.

From the industrial jobs of painting plinths and using the staple gun,

to the time consuming precision jobs of arranging small bits and pieces,

Isabelle approached everything with great consideration.

She worked so hard that she consumed an entire dry pint of blueberries.

Isabelle used to go to public school but recently began home schooling.

She has Mitochondrial disease that mainly affects cells in her brain as well as other cellular structures in her body.

1st Day – Henry PLAY FALL REST DANCE

Henry did not talk the whole time.

Not a word.

We played Glenn Gould and he set to work immediately.

He gathered every paint and drawing material available.

Then, with no hesitation, Henry started applying medium to the wall.

It was a beautiful and rare thing to witness someone unabashedly experimenting.

The way Henry applied and moved paint around was something extraordinary to behold.

He would run back to the material room and come back holding something to my face with a questioning glance.

He had found the liquid ink stash.

Using brushes, rollers, metal chunks, fingers, crayons, felt pens and chalk he worked at a relentless pace.

Often his whole body moved with repetitive gestures, mimicking the pace of Goulds music.

Henry is also an accomplished pianist.

He is diagnosed autistic.

I re-diagnose him as total genius!

Play, Fall, Rest, Dance

About the Project

Artist Valerie Salez invites children to art-making sessions to re-imagine their environment. Every child is encouraged to use fabrics, paint and repurposed materials from Salez’ previous projects. The children respond to the imaginative spaces they create through movement, dance, sound and play. The artist thoughtfully guides the children to explore their creative processes.

Looking For Youth

We’re partnering with KickStart Disability Arts and Culture to find youth with disabilities to participate in this exciting incarnation of Play, Fall, Rest, Dance. We are looking for four to six children between the ages 6–12 years old. The artist will work one on one with the child (with attendant or parent in attendance if needed).

Email Meagan Kus meagan@grunt.ca at grunt gallery if you have any questions or would like to register your child for this project, this is a free project and there is no associated cost to register. You can also reach grunt gallery by phone at 604-875-9516.

Where & When

The project will take place at grunt gallery. We’re located at 116-350 East 2nd street, Vancouver BC. We’re a few blocks from Main Street and a short walk away from the Main Street Skytrain station.

Sessions will happen one to two times per week, the artist will schedule sessions with the children based on their availability. The sessions will be 2-3 hours in length. Transportation support can be provided on request.

DOWNLOAD “Play, Fall, Rest, Dance” Information Booklet.

DOWNLOAD Poster.

About the Artist

Valerie Salez brings Play, Fall, Rest, Dance to Vancouver following a successful residency with Open Space (Victoria, BC) last year. At Open Space she worked one on one with over 20 children, guiding children to produce countless installations and performances.

Her experience with working with children and the arts includes:

>> Arts Reach (instructor: special large scale art projects in underfunded public schools- Vancouver Island)
>> Selkirk Montessori (artist in residence: work on art projects with kids with special needs and disabilities- Victoria, BC)
>> Victoria West Community center (artist in residence: working on art projects with small children- Victoria, BC)
>> Robert Service School, Dawson City, Yukon (artist in residence as special guest art teacher: two years working with at-risk and special needs First Nations children and youth)
>> Artist in the schools Victoria, BC and Yukon (special art projects in public schools in Victoria and all over the Yukon territory)
>> Canada Winter Games- National Artist Program – Whitehorse, Yukon (mentored youth in producing art works for large scale exhibition)
>> This Town is Small – Charlottetown, PEI (mentored youth artists to make work for outdoor art festival)

Learn more about Valerie and her art practice on her website.

grunt gallery

grunt.ca

grunt is an artist-run centre founded in 1984 in Vancouver, BC. We have a long history of supporting creative, challenging, and innovative projects and exhibitions. grunt hosts youth-based projects on an annual basis. In 2013, we worked with artist Desiree Palmen and 7 Aboriginal youth on the project MAMOOK IPSOOT (To Hide or Make Hidden). Learn all about it here: grunt.ca/projects/mamook-ipsoot. We are incredibly excited to host Salez and her incredible project Play, Fall, Rest, Dance.

Kickstart Disability Arts and Culture

kickstart-arts.ca

KickStart Disability Arts & Culture (formerly the Society for Disability Arts and Culture) was incorporated in November 1998 in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Kickstart’s mission is to produce and present works by artists with disabilities and to promote artistic excellence among artists with disabilities working in a variety of disciplines.