THE DIFFERENCE - RUTH EWAN
Of all the commissions in the Gymnasium programme, our Director, Sophia was most involved in the first commission by Artist Ruth Ewan. She became the Curatorial Assistant for this project, which took great influence from Lincoln’s historic connections with the Magna Carta and the Charter of the Forest and in particular the reference to the concept of an ideal space, place or world in the future.
Sophia supported Ruth in the delivery of a developed series of workshops with young people from a local primary school, which became an integral component in the realisation of her commission. The work responded directly to the children’s ideas and concepts in designing new worlds generated through the workshops. The children worked collectively to produce maps and documents that articulated their interpretation of a ‘future world’, exploring laws and ways in which their new world would function that brought continuity between the historical Magna Carta and the new commission.
From these workshops Ruth took a variety of elements that the children had created to form her commission, which included a combination of text, imagery as well as one of the reimagined maps has been developed by Ruth that was crafted into an alternative world globe.
Following the launch of this commission Sophia developed and facilitated an interactive exploration workshop for the young people involved in the workshops, giving them the opportunity to see their work come to life, see art in a new light, as well as experience contemporary art in a range of traditional and non traditional settings.
