Pottery classes at Cerebral Palsy Midlands
Rainey Community Creations CIC is a non profit organisation that brings accessible and inclusive art and crafts into the community. We are based in South Birmingham but work all over. Our pottery classes are a huge hit as we do not overshadow our participants or do their work for them. Our philosophy is that anyone can take part and create and our job is to find an accessible way to do it.
It’s been great working with CPM. After talking to a focus group we decided to start on a garden project, making bee feeders, gnomes and lots lots more to hang and sit around the garden. We’ve got very messy and have a group of diligent potters who come every week. We’ve learnt about how and why clay has to be stuck together, how to wedge and how the glaze changes as it dries and fired in the kiln. We’ve made pinch pot gnomes, slab built bird feeder and coiled pots. We’ve also had a lot of laughs. As our garden project comes to an end, we have glazed our items and once fired we’ll be putting them out for all to see.
We are also working hard on an under the sea theme, making sharks, shells and so on for later in the year. It’s only the end of May and they are already talking about what to make for Christmas. The ideas are flowing fast.
To make it more inclusive, we have used pool noodle cut offs on tools to make them easier to hold, sourced thicker and shorter paint brushes and used a clay that is easily distinguishable from the table cloth due to its darkness but ability to dry very light.
Here are some of the examples of the pottery and clay work they have been making below
Nathan's creations.
Bobbie practicsng his skills.
Vicky has created an Octopus leg.
Emma practising.
Louise etching
her gnome hat
Bobby prepping
the clay.
Carl shows us
his gnome.
In the art
workshop with Rachel.
Ben happy in Pottery.
Clifford enjoying the class.
Bens practise.
Leanne having a go.
For more information about the classes email rach at raineycommunitycreations@gmail.com.