Artist's Corner: Journal Entry 10 by artist Helena Tomlin

This is the tenth blogpost by artist Helena Tomlin. You can read her previous entries here.

Last week we held the creative collage workshop ‘ The Museum of Me’ at The Central Reference Library 

What a delightful and emotional afternoon. 

We photocopied individual objects that participants had brought in and made a little museum display (box) to house the images in. The photocopies were worked on with thread, dried flowers, pastels, pencil crayons and a stamp set (for introducing text). All these additions recorded the emotions that emerged from discussion of each special object. 

Participants all shared their feelings about their objects and their family history and I felt privileged to work with the participants to facilitate the creation of some beautiful pieces of work. 

We spent a part of the afternoon discussing the piece I had made for the Centre for Jewish Studies 50 Objects Project; the process involved in selecting the objects and the route I had taken to the completion of the artwork (all recorded in the previous blogposts...). 

Our conversations followed some interesting paths 

How can you find a way of expressing sometimes conflicted feelings about family history (both celebratory but sometimes painful)? 

Surprise at how using a simple creative method (in this case using a photocopier and collage elements) can highlight a particular response to an object that had been (up until now) hidden. 

The importance of sharing ideas about family histories with others, and to realise that many common threads emerge in this exploration. 

We had a chance to look at all the mini museums together and enjoy the different approaches – all had their own ‘character’; and I hope to do this workshop again sometime! It was inspirational.