www.KristinHarrisDesign.com
I Can Do That! A Kids World Art Game
(updated 12.1.14)
Inspiration
This summer I participated in a Digital Storytelling Workshop at the Startup Summer Institute at Howard University's Middle School of Mathematics and Science. As a trainer for Demibooks, I was helping students use their app development tool Composer Pro to publish animated interactive stories for iPads. I came to assist Geeta Raj. She is the founder of Global Sleepover and brings years of experience in international development and humanitarian assistance with USAID. She has lived in Afghanistan, Columbia, South Sudan, Albania, the UK, Bosnia and Herzegovina. She has degrees in Creative Writing and International Peace and Conflict Resolution.
Geeta's passion for thinking internationally is infectious. She spent a week working with the middle school students before I arrived the last week of July. She discussed with the students the principles of storytelling and helped them each craft a story involving another country. One student's project was about a gymnast who became the Queen of England, another was a mystery to be solved about competing film companies in India and there was a story about surfers in the Caribbean. Egypt, China and Canada were represented in the collection of stories the students wrote, illustrated and animated. Geeta inspired me to further emphasize global awareness in my app development projects for preschool kids.
The World in Our First Two Apps
I have certainly had a global vision to some extent with my first two apps. My focus has been introducing young children to great world art treasures, many from ancient cultures all over the world. Duck Takes a Ride: An Art Story features nine animals from ancient China and Egypt from a series of major art museums. Each animal writes a letter to the reader about where it was made and its current museum home.
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| Duck-form censer, Portland Art Museum, China, Han Dynasty, 206 BCE–220 CE, bronze |
ABC.DC: An Art Alphabet, featuring artworks from the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC. includes Yellow Warbler by Scottish artist, Joseph Bartholomew Kidd, a sweet portrait of a young girl by French artist Berthe Morisot and many other European artist. In fact the majority of countries represented in the alphabetical images are European, in keeping with the National Gallery collection.
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| John Could and H.D. Richter, Blue Breasted Quail, Courtesy of the National Gallery of Art |
Objectives
Moving forward from these two projects, I wanted to do more to acknowledge the origin of the objects in my future development projects. One of the compelling reason to introduce these objects to young children, beyond their appeal, is that they carry with them information about their culture. We learn things about ancient China by spending time with the Duck. As an artist, I don't even need to be able to precisely articulate what we learn to appreciate the value of the experience. Although in this case I am profoundly respectful of not only their artistic abilities with such a delightfully naturalistic depiction of an animal, but their technical prowess casting bronze, long before it happened in the West.
I had another idea I wanted to incorporate in this next app. iPads can be dangerously mesmerizing, especially for very young children. I see it all the time. I wanted to make my next app get kids to react in real time, in the real world to what they are experiencing on the iPad. Hence, the concept for Art Moves Around the World started to materialize. I wanted to not only introduce wonderful global art treasures, I wanted to animate them and have kids try to mimic that movement.
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| Homepage, Art Moves Around the World: A Kid's Game |
Selecting the art that will be included in my aps is a very favorite activity. I have spent hours perusing the collections of the National Gallery of Art, the Brooklyn Museum, the Portland Art Museum, LACMA, the Walters Art Museum, the Yale University Art Gallery and others institutions that have either placed images into the public domain or indicate no copyright restrictions. This is a blissful activity with many rewards. I find works of art that fit my criteria for my project and I get to see 1,000 images for every one I select. I don't even think I am exaggerating! The primary criteria is being kid-friendly and relevant to my objectives for that particular app.
I decided on ten three-dimensional objects from all corners of the world. The Walters Art Museum in Baltimore, MD was a new collection (for me) to research and I was very taken by their collection of Precolumbian objects. Two examples are included in Art Moves Around the World. I always gravitate to Asian art and there are two pieces from China and one from Japan. The Brooklyn Museum and Brooklyn are also represented in the lion from Coney Island. The homepage of Art Moves Around the World above, displays art treasures that were made in the United States, Mexico, Peru, Canada, France, Liberia, Japan and China.
A Closer Look at One of Them
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| Helmet Mask (Zogbe) for Sande Society Brooklyn Museum Arts of Africa collection Gift of Drs. John and Nicole Dintenfass |
I love this mask. Brilliantly the Brooklyn Museum included various images of the mask from different angles. The images worked perfectly for creating an animation of our friend flicking braids to and fro.
Move Me
I need to be very careful about the file size of my completed app, so I am gradually learning how to make satisfying animations with less than (gasp even) 10 frames. These are short of course, but enough to inspire little hands and feet to get moving.
On the Move Me page,once an object is selected by tapping,the first task for a young "player" of this game, is to find/reveal the object. They are all hidden underneath an assortment of small pieces of art related by theme, location or concept to the hidden work. Below, African beaded segments from a Yoruba crown obscures the mask.
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| Segments are from LACMA, Oba's Royal Crown, Africa, Nigeria, Yoruba peoples, 20th century
Glass beads embroidered on plain weave striped and printed cotton over a metal frame
Gift of Drs. James and Gladys Strain (AC1993.219.9)
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Production Tools
These projects are produced using Demibook Composer Studio. I have found this to be a very effective tool for my own development as well as a tool to use with students. That and Photoshop, Illustrator, AfterEffects and SoundBooth are all invaluable resources.
Join Me
Many years ago, when my son was very young and I was investigating preschools I visited a class where 3 year-olds were sitting on the floor with the teacher and she had an inflated globe she was showing them. At first, it seemed silly to me, how could these kids have any idea what they were seeing. Heavens, how do we as adults even really imagine ourselves on a spinning ball whirling through space. Then it hit me that of course it made sense to start talking about the world to three year olds. We talk to them about stars and clouds and lots of other things we know they don't completely understand at first. (My son did attend that preschool for a number of years.)
Join me in celebrating great world art treasures and the joy in sharing them with children eager to learn about the world.
Senior
Program Analyst with the United States Agency for International
Development (USAID). - See more at:
http://www.globalsleepover.com/team/#sthash.Rvpn3UUQ.dpuf
career
in international development and humanitarian assistance - See more
at: http://www.globalsleepover.com/team/#sthash.Rvpn3UUQ.dpuf
career
in international development and humanitarian assistance - See more
at: http://www.globalsleepover.com/team/#sthash.Rvpn3UUQ.dpuf
Really looking forward to seeing your new project come to life, Kristin!
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