As part of Rotherham Roots Festival, an event celebrating nature and Rotherham’s connection to it, I was asked to run a series of workshops within the community. At these children and family drop in workshops on the run up to the festival, we had to create artwork that could be carried in the procession.
Since the theme was nature, and specifically the River Don, I decided to facilitate a catch your own fish workshop. Using acetate sheets and opaque pens, I asked participants to “catch a fish” by drawing around vintage English river fish illustrations. I encouraged the participants to add patterns and textures as the scales, or create their own fish using heads of one fish and tales and scales of another. The workshops were really successful and worked well as a drop in activity. It was a relaxing and mindful drawing exercise which was approachable to any artistic skill level or age.
I used the acetates created in the workshops to create cyanotype prints on fabric, including everyones fish. As cyanotype is blue, the finished flag could be waved like moving water, representing the community of Rotherham that helped create it and their connection to the River Don running through the town.
The final flag was carried by the community in the Rotherham Roots Festival procession.
Commissioned by Flux Rotherham, in conjunction with the Rotherham Children’s Capital of Culture Team and Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council events team.
