Organization
ABC (ART BASICS for CHILDREN) is a non-profit organisation located in Brussels. Operating on the border of the arts and education, it is a lab for aesthetic experiences and creative awareness.
We create stimulating environments and projects that encourage children and adults of all ages to experiment with their imagination and to explore their creative potential. Interactive working-stations are equipped with selected books (in different languages), visuals and specific research and playing materials. The well-defined settings of these ‘working-stations’ enable small groups of visitors to explore and investigate at ease and with confidence. Supportive ABC-guides encourage the creative process as an opening for dialogue and as a reflective tool so participants can independently develop their own way of integrating art in the daily life.
ABC has a permanent home-base near the Brussels North Station. Schoolclasses, students, teachers, families, field-workers and professionals can consult our open source-collection and can discover different studios, several ateliers, a kitchen, a movement & meditation-space, a little theatre, a garden, a laboratory –classroom etc.
In the past ABC has created mobile studios on a variety of conceptual topics, such as: architecture & design, nature & aesthetics, visual poetry, surrealism… But also about the culture of Nepal or China, the period of the Italian Renaissance, or around inspirational artists like Leonardo Da Vinci, Hans Arp, Joan Miró and Dick Bruna…
ABC regularly creates -sometimes by request- new themed studios.
Contact:
E: mail@abc-web.be, T: 02.5020027
Project
How do image and music influence each other, how do they enhance one another, how do we get color in music and sound in the image? These are just a few questions that we explore playfully in the mobile studio, ‘Visual Music’.
‘Visual Music’ is an umbrella term that covers a lot of ground:
The original definition claims it is the, ‘translation of music into paintings’. But Visual Music also covers:
the use of musical structures in visual images
methods that convert sounds / music into related visual presentations
systems that instantly convert sounds / music to visual forms (film, video, computer graphics) by means of mechanical instruments or a computer; the reverse process is also possible, namely converting forms to music.
The interactive ABC-studio for Visual Music invites children, families and art lovers of all ages to an artistic cross-over experience between music and painting, film, architecture and the daily life. Listening to Kandinsky, Klee or Matisse in the visual music-gallery, making rhythmic toys and instruments in the atelier, painting and drawing music or just enjoying musical storytelling in the concert-café… A foley-station offers lots of materials to create your own filmmusic/soundtrack, and our lab stimulates to experiment and play with sound-sculptures and visual acoustics.
A swinging adventure to open eyes, ears and hearts with the visual sound of music.
Target Audiences
Families: for children 5 years old and above, and their families
Schools: for all classes of primary and secondary school
Mediators such as (future) teachers/youth- and social-cultural workers/music teachers, musicians & artists
Students in music/film/graphics/sculpture…
Formula/set design
The ABC crew can construct the mobile studio (minimum 120 m2) in one day.
ABC will bring the necessary and pre-constructed furniture for the Visual Music set up..
Artistic exchange/platform
Studio Visual Music also wants to present audio-visual installations, kinetic or tonal sculptures, meta-mechanical works, action or sonore sculptures… of local and/or national artists of the different partners involved in this project. In this sense we shape the content a bit differently each time according to local/national dynamics, while keeping with the same structure and spirit.
Training: Course for and exchange with attendants
An ABC head guide provides a two-day training course (minimum) for local attendants (in English, French or German): i.e. introductions to all the different materials and the innumerable possibilities of how to engage children with them.
An exchange of ideas with the partner regarding the content/materials is one of the main objectives.
Please find more about the project in the appendix.