Weekly We Make: Exquisite Monster

Share:

About the Weekly We Make Activity

Exquisite Monsters is based on a collaborative drawing game invented by the Surrealists called Exquisite Corpse. In this activity, several people work together to draw strange, surprising, and often funny creatures or figures. Come make monsters with us.

 

About Weekly We Make

It’s an art party! Weekly We Make at the MacKenzie Art Gallery, presented by Canada Life, is an opportunity for individuals and families to drop in and create artwork.

Learn about the artists and artworks in MacKenzie’s Permanent Collection and featured exhibitions with weekly in-person hands-on workshops that can be modified for all ages. Visit our studio to make art with Gallery Educators and guest artists, exploring new and beloved techniques and art materials.

There is no cost to attend these drop-in sessions. All materials are provided.

Canada Life logo

The Artwork Spine

Maia Stark’s artworks contain many references to the practices of the historic art movement Surrealism. One of Maia’s many interests in Surrealism is in the games that the surrealists invented and played. Some reference to the strange monsters that can come from the surrealist game “Exquisite Corpse” can be seen in Maia’s work Spine. Exquisite Corpse is a drawing game where several people work together to make strange and surprising creatures. In the game, each participant draws part of a creature on a piece of paper, leaving room for their collaborators to contribute. Then, they share their paper with their collaborators, and their collaborators contribute another part to the creature. Once everyone has added their part and the paper is unfolded, the group discovers the funny, weird, or wonderful creature they created together! 

ABOUT THE ARTIST

Maia Stark is an artist living in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, who is interested in how people’s bodies and feelings can be shown through stories and pictures. Her drawings, paintings, and clay creations often include references to folktales and fairytales, history and memories, and her family background from Iceland, Ireland, and Scotland. Because Maia is an identical twin, she often uses twins, dopplegangers, and doubles to tell stories about who people are and how they see themselves. 

Studio Activity

Exquisite Corpse is a collaborative drawing game invented by the Surrealists. In this activity, several people work together to draw strange, surprising, and often funny creatures or figures. 

MATERIALS

  • Paper/Drawing paper/scrap paper 
  • Collage materials 
  • Pencils, pens, markers, and pencil crayons 
  • Tracing paper 
  • Tape/glue (for attached collage materials) 

INSTRUCTIONS

In groups of 2 or 3, work to make collaborative drawings:  

  1. Everyone receives a piece of paper.  
  2. Use a portion of the paper to begin drawing part of a creature, character, or figure.  
  3. Fold your paper so your drawing is mostly hidden. Leave just a tiny bit visible, then pass the paper to your neighbor. Be careful not to reveal your drawing.   
  4. Receive a folded paper from your other neighbor. Do not look at what they have drawn.  
  5. Use the tiny, exposed drawing clues as inspiration for adding to your neighbor’s drawing.  
  6. Repeat steps 3 to 5 until you receive your original paper back.  
  7. Unfold your paper and reveal the collaborative drawing. 
  8. Feel free to make changes directly to the paper, draw on top of it, trace, block, and personalize your monster.  
  9. Build a story around your monster by answering questions like “where does it live? What does it eat? And what is it good at?” 
  10. Feel free to redraw or alter your creature to explore how small changes can shift a story. 

THINGS TO THINK ABOUT

  • How can you tell that this artwork tells a story? How did Pitseolak tell us that this is a story visually?
  • This artwork has a strong sense of line, one of the many elements of art. In what ways does it use lines? How do the lines help tell the story?

IMPORTANT WORDS

  • Collaboration / collaborative: the act of working together with people or other living beings.   
  • Surrealism: an art movement from the 1920s and 1930s that focused on the depiction of dreams rather than reality.  
  • Exquisite: is a descriptive word that means beautiful, exceptional, or unique.