The Dolls House – looking back

Sunday marked the final day of The Dolls House exhibition. Yesterday and today the dolls are being packed up in their boxes, ready for transport back to their owners. It was a great exhibition and we’re sad to see it go. But tomorrow is a new day (as is today) and we’re looking forward to our next exhibition, Circles of Life – Mandala Magic by Karen Scott and her students.

But today, I wanted to share with you an interesting adventure that happened during the Dolls House.

A young girl, around 11 or so, came in with her grandmother and her younger sister, clutching a bag to her chest. She said that she’d found a doll with a broken foot in her neighbour’s Hard Rubbish pile on the front lawn, and her neighbour said she could have it. The girl named her new doll Chelsea, but nobody knew anything about the doll, and this young girl was wondering if we could help her identify it.

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The Dolls House – interview with Colin Robinson

I’ve just come across the Dandenong Leader’s online article about the Doll’s House exhibition (which you can read here: http://dandenong-leader.whereilive.com.au/lifestyle/story/video-doll-exhibition-at-heritage-hill/) and in it, it has a video of Colin Robinson, the man behind most of the dolls we exhibited here. It’s a bit late for the exhibition itself, but now you can relive the experience forever!

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Behind the scenes of The Doll’s House

Yesterday was the last day of the doll exhibition and today was the big day that Ken and Barbie had been waiting for. Now their work is over, they finally were able to enjoy the garden with the children at Heritage Hill.

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School Holiday workshop – All Hands on the Puppet

Today the wonderful Penelope Bartlau from Barking Spider Visual Theatre came out to do a workshop with us called All Hands on the Puppet. She told us about the Japanese art of Bunraku where the puppets are the size of a 5 year old child and they take three puppeteers to move. With Pene’s help, we made our own Bunraku style puppets out of newspaper.

It’s amazing how much you can create with just newspaper and masking tape!

All Hands on the Puppet is designed for families to co-operate with the designing, making and puppeteering. There needs to be lots of talking and negotiation in the design process.

Some people made big puppets…

And some people made little ones.

Then Pene (with a little help from our Public Programs officer, Sayra) showed us how to puppeteer our brand new puppets. Pene moved it’s head and arms while Sayra concentraited on it’s legs. It moved like it was alive!

We practised our puppeteering and then…

We put on a show! We each did a little scene between two puppets.

This puppet is saying “Goodbye!”

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School Holiday event – Old Fashioned Games Afternoon

Yesterday, we held our Old Fashioned Games afternoon. There was afternoon tea, games and the final prize draw for our colouring competition.

It was a cold and rainy day in Dandenong, but we were warm and toasty inside playing old fashioned games.

 

There was fairy bread, apples and oranges, juice and tea and coffee for the grown ups. Guess which treat disappeared first…

 

We had a ring toss, which is much harder than you might think. On the surface, you throw the rope rings over the little pole, which is called a peg. Sounds simple, but it’s actually quite challenging.

We played Hopscotch, which has different rules in different countries. Some people knew how to play it, and they taught others. Because we were inside, we didn’t use rocks as markers but colourful buttons in the shape of hearts and teapots.

 

We had an Art Class in our old fashioned school room, colouring in pictures of people playing old fashioned games. Here the girls are colouring in girls on bikes and a group of kids having a sing-a-long.

 

We also played an old fashioned board game, called Picaria, which is a South American game. It’s like a more complicated Tic-Tac-Toe.

 

We also had the final prize giving for our colouring comp. These were all the entries for the second draw. If you look carefully, in one corner if a number of the dolls we’ve been making in the holidays.

Here is one of our amazing artists receiving her prize. Thanks to everyone who entered, the quality of the art was really fantastic.

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School Holiday workshop – Fabric Dolls

It’s a cold and rainy day here in Dandenong today, but that only seems to make the creative grow (or is that flow?)

Today we were sewing fabric dolls and there were some beautiful dolls created!

 
First, you need to cut out your dolls. Arms, legs, clothing, hair all needs to be considered and created.

 

Then you need to sew your doll together. Some people had sewn before, some only learned today. But everyone agreed that it was actually pretty simple when you get down to it.

 

Some people worked together with mums and grandmas to create their dolls.

 

This was the final result. Beautiful dolls, some with flowing hair and elegant dresses, some with short hair and day clothing, all colours of the rainbow. All the dolls looked really happy, and so did all the participants!

 

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School Holiday workshop – Worry Dolls

The September school holidays got off to a flying (and colourful) start today with our Worry Dolls workshop.

The Worry Dolls tradition comes from Guatemala where children whisper their worries at night to small, colourful dolls. They then place these dolls under their pillows, believing that the dolls will hold the worries for the children, so the children can get a good night’s sleep.

These little dolls have a big important job to do!

So today, participants in the Worry Doll workshop made their own Worry Dolls to share their worries with. Check out some of the dolls created!

This Worry Doll was one of the first ones finished. It blends in nicely with it’s maker’s dress. Lots of kids made the Worry Dolls in colours they were wearing.

 

Yarn was flying about all over the place. Everyone made super colourful Worry Dolls. There was a Richmond supporter Worry Doll, several disco Worry Dolls and a superhero Worry Doll or two.

 

Everyone made at least 2 dolls each. A few made up to 4!

 

If you look carefully, you’ll see in this picture 2 Worrd Dolls and one Worry Mermaid.

In the end there were over 45 Worry Dolls created to take home. Phew! That’s a weight off our mind…

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Cloth Doll Workshop

On Saturday, October 17, Kerry Markham of the Australian Cloth Dolls Association held an all day Cloth Doll workshop in Laurel Lodge. Cloth dolls are usually highly worked, very solid artistic dolls made to look at not to play with. It can take weeks to create a single doll and workshops can go for several days. Kerrie proimised us that this doll wouldn’t take as long as that! 

Kerrie was lovely and very knowledgable, the conversation was pleasant, the learning curve not too steep and at the end of the day we all had a beautiful elf doll to take home. 

Have a look at some of the photos from the day:

These were two elves Kerrie made previously from the pattern she was teaching us

 

One of our participants laying out her pattern pieces.

 

Kerrie , left, explains a technique to two of our participants.

 

An elf cut and sewn but yet to be stuffed.

 

Here Kerrie uses a gel pen to create details in the little elf’s face.

 

Four of the finished elves having a chat

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