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The Creative Dinner Party

In this creative dinner party the participants imagine and paint their favorite meals onto a shared tablecloth. Guided by storytelling, they co-create a vibrant and colorful artwork that serves to reflect personal tastes, cultural identities, and obviously each participant’s creativity. By adding food, drinks, and utensils, the group builds a collective scene that celebrates diversity, inclusion, and self-expression in a playful and collaborative setting.

THEME

Inclusion, self-expression, cultural identity, co-creation through a creative “dinner”

COMPLEXITY

from beginner and up

GROUP SIZE

5-15

participants

AGE

13+

TIME

1

hour

Objectives

  • Encourage self-expression, celebrate diversity, foster inclusion, sharing and feeling the artistic and creative process in a safe space.

Materials

  • An old tablecloth, paint, water, paint brushes (materials can vary depending on the nature of the group)

Overview

Participants paint their favorite meals on a shared tablecloth, encouraging them to reflect on their own preferences while co-creating a colorful dinner party-artwork that celebrates creativity, culture, and inclusion.

Step-by-Step Instructions:

1. Introduction, material, demonstration (10 min.)

  • Welcoming the participants to the creative dinner-party (sitting around the table with a tablecloth on or at the floor). It works best if the facilitator finds the proper storyline for setting the scene. Here is an example:
  • Look at the empty tablecloth. What’s missing?
  • Ask the participants about their personal favorite food.
  • Trigger their imagination and tell them that we are visiting one of the finest restaurants in the world. At this restaurant they can be served whatever they want.
  • But first everyone must paint it on the tablecloth.

 

2. Work (40 min.)

  • What would you like to eat? Paint it on the tablecloth (have paint and brushes ready).
  • In the process, it is essential to ask the participants what kind of tools they normally use at the dinner table, e.g. fingers, chopsticks, forks and knives, spoons etc. Paint them.
  • What do you want to drink? What kind of glasses do you need? Paint them.

 

3. Reflection and Debriefing:

Reflection as a group (10 min.)

    • Place the tablecloth on the floor. Look at it.
    • Express what you see and think.
    • The creative dinner-party has become a cooperative piece of art. Everyone has contributed and expressed their creativity and artistic way of work.

Debriefing

    • After the painting process, everybody looks at the result, together. The discussion starts about the different kinds of meals at the table. What is the difference between them?

Debriefing and Evaluation:

The toy animal Lisa facilitates the debriefing process. Lisa asks the participants questions like:

  • “What did you think of when you made this sculpture?”,
  • “How was it to make the sculpture?”,
  • “How was it to create with other people?”.

Make sure that Lisa examines all the sculptures and includes the participants in the conversation on the way around the garden.  Maybe there are artists who want to show Lisa their sculpture themselves.

If you find it appropriate, include questions about the upcycling aspect of the workshop:

  • “How do you see this now, that was trash just before?”
  • “What can we bring into other aspects of our lives?

Tips for Facilitators:

  • Talk positively about the process. Show your respect for everyone and the collective result.
  • Remember there is no right or wrong way to be creative.

The Garbage Art Garden has become a cooperative piece of art. Everyone has contributed and expressed their creativity and artistic way of work, and The Trash Art Garden has become a very special piece of art with a lot of different expressions.

Variations and adjustments:

  • Can be other settings than a garden – a village, a museum, a festival, a circus, etc. Instead of the toy animal it could be another facilitator that comes to see the garden in the end. It can be anything and have different forms, imagination and personality.

Disclaimer:

  • Be aware of choking hazards.  

Contact

Iuliana Adriana PAVEL (project manager)

iuliana.pavel@a4action.ro
A4ACTION – Antim Ivireanu Culture House, Islaz Alley, Ghermănești, Snagov, Ilfov District, Romania, 077170

Co-funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the ANPCDEFP. Neither the European Union nor the ANPCDEFP can be held responsible for them.

The project is conducted by the following organisations: A4ACTION (Romania) – coordinator, Udruga Delta (Croatia), InterAktion (Austria), Asociación Espacio Rojo (Spain) and GAIA Museum Outsider Art (Denmark).

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