Big draw presentation for Dover Big Local

3. The BIG DRAW
The Big Draw is the world’s biggest drawing
festival: it is an international celebration of
drawing that has grown from one day in October
2000 in the UK to an annual month-long festival
of drawing across the the world.

4. BIG DRAW IN DOVER 2015
Every Drawing Tells a Story is the Big Draw theme for 2015 and we invited Greg Stobbs, aka
Squirl, to lead this year’s workshop on 26 October. About 60 people of all ages took part as
participants and volunteers. It was nice to welcome new participants as well as to see some
returning participants from last year. The challenge was to tell a story in a single, non-linear
image, something which everyone succeeded in doing.
“It was lovely to see the different generations telling each other their stories” (Petra Matthews
Crow).
The photos of the drawings have been incorporated into design by Squirl for window graphics
to be placed in Dover Children’s Library.
Like last year, we were fortunate to have the use of the Dover Discovery Centre Cafe area
thanks to Sarah Bottle, Coast Librarian.
The workshop was organised by Dover Arts Development in partnership with Dover Big Local
Art31. It was supported by Dover Town Council and Dover Big Local.
All Photos by Fleur Whitfield.

5. An object to draw…

6. An object to draw…

7. An object to draw…

8. An object to draw…

9. …in a place

10. …in a place

11. …to tell a story

12. …to tell a story

13. …to tell a story

14. …to tell a story

15. …to tell a story

16. Participants of all ages

17. Volunteers from DBL Art31 group

18. Squirl (the artist)

19. Value
• An activity that kept people positively active and engaged:
some participants came for a few minutes but stayed over
an hour
• Although a one day activity can only make a small
contribution to making Dover a better place to live, it may
help by encouraging otherwise reluctant drawers to
experience for themselves the positive effects of engaging
in a contemplative activity for an extended period of time.
• This year's theme of story telling encouraged positive
intergenerational communication.

20. Value: Ways to wellbeing
• Connection: By drawing together with others
and in particular children with their parents
• Learning: new drawing and communication
skills
• Taking notice: close observation of an object

21. Value
• It is hard to overstate the importance of drawing,
not so much as a skill but rather as a process for
thinking and learning. It is also all-absorbing and
forces other things from the mind, making it
valuable for boosting wellbeing and relieving
stress. There are also other, perhaps less obvious
benefits. The arts are always one of the first
things to be cut, but a recent article suggests that
the long-term economic toll of cutting the arts
could actually harm a country's economic
competitiveness.

22. Value
• A new study from Michigan State University found that childhood
participation in arts and crafts leads to innovation, patents, and increases
the odds of starting a business as an adult. The researchers found that
people who own businesses or patents received up to eight times more
exposure to the arts as children than the general public.
•
• ..... Creative activity in childhood rewires your brain to think out-of-the-box
according to the researchers. In fact, the group reported using artistic
skills—such as analogies, playing, intuition and imagination—are all key to
solving complex problems. This is common sense, but it’s good to have
economic researchers validate the importance of the arts.
•
• https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-athletes-
way/201310/childhood-creativity-leads-innovation-in-adulthood

23. Value
‘Growth’ means more than economic recovery…
‘Growth’ means more than earning some
paper…
‘Growth’ is exploring and learning from failure.
Through that process we tend to rise.
And what better teacher than enterprise?
(From All Existence is Contribution)

24. Value
Most school-leavers are not going to have job security.
“With a life expectancy pushing 100, they will need skills
of risk-taking, resilience, empathy and creativity to
prosper in their long working lives. They will need multi-
disciplinary knowledge and skills. They will have several
careers and multiple sources of income.”
More and more of us are becoming and will have to
become mini-entrepreneurs.
https://www.tes.com/news/school-news/breaking-
views/opinion-if-we-want-our-children-flourish-we-must-
challenge-narrowing

25. Design for the library

26. Thank you
• http://www.dadonline.eu/updates/big-draw-
2015/
• www.dadonline.eu
• info@dadonline.eu
• www.doverbiglocal.org