PAX on Earth
Those of you who follow my blog may or may not know that I set myself a project over the summer.
Right at the beginning of the summer, I witnessed a rather horrific occurrence outside my window. I wasn’t at all sure how to respond, or indeed if I could respond, so I decided to do what I know I could do well – make paintings. With the advent of the summer holidays, I felt pretty sure that there were going to be lots of kids hanging around with nothing to do, pretty bored, so I hit upon an idea.
There’s a website of artists’ work called Free Art Friday. Basically the idea is that you leave out a piece of work on the street on a Friday, for anyone to just pick up and take home to put on their wall at no cost. It’s a great idea on many levels – art for the masses, etc., So I decided, where time permitted, to leave some work out on the waste ground outside my flat every Friday. In the end, I made 4 works out of old boards and any other stuff I could find that had been left out on our estate as rubbish.
PAX Trinity. Put out Friday. Various kids came and looked and commented all good comments. They were shuffled about from time to time, and finally disappeared the following Wednesday.
Ethiopian PAX. Put out on the Friday. Mostly stayed where it was for the weekend. On the following Monday night, it was attacked by two kids with bricks, and then was thrown about for the rest of the week. It’s made from pretty rigid materials so, it wasn’t really easy to break up, so it floated around the estate for most of the summer.
Evolution of PAX This lasted most of the weekend and I overheard lots of good comments, then it disappeared for couple of days before it re-appeared in small bits later in the week.
PAX Target. This lasted the shortest amount of time. It was put out at 6am on the Friday, and by the time I came home at 4pm it was also smashed up.
So, what did I learn from this? If you’re not careful, something like this can just re-inforce your worst fears and beliefs about a situation or a group of people. Our media has spent a lot of time demonising kids, but in a situation where funding for youth clubs have been cut to nothing, kids are bored and having options for expressing themselves reduced by the minute.
It’s a sad state of affairs that for some, they feel that the only responses open to them are violence and destruction, but it’s important not to forget that a lot of good comments were made by many kids, and people did come and sit and just look.
The subject matter of PAX or peace was a deliberate choice, and was a prayer of hope from me. It was helpful to think that in some way I am able to contribute to my environment, and frankly I’d rather they hurled rocks at my artwork instead of cars, windows or people (all of which I have witnessed on occasion). But I shudder to think what will happen when these people grow up and find their options limited further still. This generation is not being looked after properly, and the consequences may well prove disastrous. As moot looks to move to an area that has its own share of socio-economic deprivation, I am still pondering the possible implications, if any, and whether creatively, we can model something positive and Christian for people.
