The wall-filling shelf in the workshop is a veritable museum of things: Jam jars full of brushes and pens are lined up in it, boxes of driftwood find space, wax crayons in all shades of color can be found, stamps and pads, inks, boxes full of paper, thick and thin, shimmering and matt, and right next to it in drawers stacked on top of each other, shots are waiting for a new use, as are collected aluminum parts, candy wrappers, champagne corks or foil and a hodgepodge of exotic shells.
The shelf has attraction. The children and young people who attend the courses at the youth art school “School of Fantasy Gräfelfing” are always standing in amazement in front of it, searching the shelves with their eyes. All the shelf treasures are keys to their imagination. Once unlocked, the creative spirit released, the children create enchanting fantasy worlds with them.
The “School of Fantasy Gräfelfing” shakes up the creativity in the children. The colourful, material-filled workshop in the basement of the primary school in Gräfelfing offers the space and atmosphere in which children can live out their curiosity, discover their joy of experimentation and experience their creative power. “We don’t make art,” says Luzi Gross, who is part of the team of six course leaders. The impressive work of art at the end of a course day is not the goal. Rather, the children should get to know different techniques, get involved themselves and experience what it means to be artistically active.
And so the children and young people between the ages of five and 15 who attend the courses try out painting on the easel, mix colors themselves, learn about various printing techniques, and work sculpturally with wood, stone and clay. They invent games, build room-high towers from colorful blocks, pour sand pictures, invent picture stories and go into the forest for land art projects. They develop a new view of the world when an aluminum yoghurt lid becomes a relief or a piece of tree root becomes a bird. “Get an idea of the world with both hands” is the school’s motto and what children actively do week after week in the school’s courses.
More than 30 years ago, Lilli Plodeck founded the Gräfelfing School of Fantasy based on the concept of Rudolf Seitz, professor at the Munich Art Academy. At that time, Seitz, with whom Plodeck himself studied art education, gave a “firework display” of lectures to the municipal council, she recalls. It was the door opener for the founding of the school in Gräfelfing, initially the municipality bore the entire cost. Today, the school of imagination is a local institution and a whole generation of children and young people has embarked on artistic journeys of discovery in the courses. Plodeck says that former students are now sending their own children to the courses. Since 2013, the school of fantasy has been operating as a non-profit limited company and is a member of the regional association of youth art schools.
Children and young people who otherwise have no access to art are also reached
The school of imagination also brings creative work to children and young people who otherwise have no access to art or to the courses. Since 2015 there has been a cooperation with the primary school, which started as a model project of the Ministry of Education with the aim of integrating creative work into the curriculum. The school of imagination represented the region of Upper Bavaria. For two years, the elementary school has continued the project with her on their own initiative, financed by subsidies from the school and the community foundation. There is also cooperation with the middle school in Lochham and there are frequent joint projects in which pupils often enter new territory. Plodeck remembers her asking the students who had ever been to the museum – exactly one raised a hand. A land art project, in which the students worked in the forest with moss, branches or roots and discovered their creative talent, turned out to be a true pioneering achievement, “many had never been to the forest”.
The school also participates in art events in public spaces
The creative spirit also leaves the workshops and shows itself: the school of imagination repeatedly takes part in art events in public space. Making the children’s artistic work visible is a central component of the school concept. And so, in cooperation with the Gräfelfingen waste disposal company Wittmann, the children have already decorated twelve garbage trucks with huge drawings and texts on the subject of waste in the environment, painted the pedestrian underpass at the S-Bahn station and, most recently, after the federal election, designed election posters on the station square on which they formulated their wishes to the politicians in a creative way.
Childlike-creative hodgepodge.
(Photo: Catherine Hess)
The works also become visible when, for example, the works of the middle school students are exhibited in the small gallery “Ideenreich” in the community center or the students take part in exhibitions of the art group. Postcards from campaigns are also repeatedly printed or leporellos are duplicated, which the children can distribute. This makes the children proud and they feel valued, according to the experience of the course leaders. Being part of something during project work and being effective in a group is a new experience for many, says Luzi Gross.
In the best case scenario, when the fantasy students go home, they take with them a great deal of confidence in their own abilities, says Plodeck. They trust their eyes, have experienced self-efficacy and developed self-confidence. Above all, the desire and curiosity for art is kindled. Whether it always succeeds like that, she can only guess. Sometimes feedback from parents and students suggests that the school is on the right track. Like the father recently who took his daughter to the course and said: “I don’t know what they are doing here, but my daughter is happy.”