Paddy Art Classes - #1 Butterflies

My lovely lovely Mum is a resident at Pademelon, a secure residence for people with dementia.

Mum is now non-verbal. She has lost nearly all her ability to care for herself, and also much of her interest in just about everything - she walks continuously and needs full assistance for every aspect of her personal care, from the time she wakes up to the moment she goes to bed.

Despite all this, she still seems to recognise us (judging by the look on her face when I walk through the door) and is still quick with a laugh. She loves to dance and gives kisses freely - she is a joy to be with, and she still is, as she always has been, my mum!

I've recently started doing art 'classes' with the residents at Paddy ....
For our first project I had no time at all for preparation, so I 'borrowed' it almost exactly from Kathy Barbro over at Art Projects for Kids. I saw the idea on her post Butterflies from Central Asia which featured a mural by one of Kathy's followers, using one of her butterfly designs.

We completed our butterflies as two 45cm square canvases.

I provided the residents with a palette of warm colours, a blank canvas (divided roughly into quarters with a red painted line, with an overlaid square in the middle) and a large black marker drawing of a butterfly. The residents then painted them.... bearing in mind that these are people with varying degrees of advanced dementia, I had many variations in degrees of participation - from the higher functioning ladies who sat for an hour meticulously painting the butterfly, to the people with lower functioning who painted a few brush strokes as they walked past, or contributed a brush-stroke with me guiding their hand. I also needed to give lots of encouragement and suggestions for "a bit of yellow here do you think?"

We didn't need to worry about staying in the lines, as they were going to be cut out and outlined heavily with black glue.

We repeated the process the following week with a cool palette.

There was great hilarity when we spattered the backgrounds with yellow paint!

When both were complete I cut out the butterflies and glued them onto the backgrounds with Mod Podge, outlined them with black glue, then sealed everything with another coat of Mod Podge.
(Next time I will try using Elmers Rubber Cement as the glue, as the butterflies have warped a little bit.)

They are so proud of their accomplishment on this project, and I am so proud of them. Some of the 'walkers' touch them as they go past (the black glue makes a raised line that feels good). Rose and June want them to be hanging in their rooms, but we have them in the lounge for everyone to enjoy :)