GROUP POSER: Isabel Coppenrath, second right, with her team of managers from Stenden University. Photo: Umer Nangiana
By Umer Nangiana
You never know how big an artist you may be until your creative instinct is put to the test. The result can sometimes surprise you. As it did Laila Radi, the 12-year-old Grade 6 student from German International School Doha.
She tried her hand at sculpturing for the very first time and the falcon she designed with clay came out to be more ‘real’ than she had expected. Sitting beside the young artist, the falcon appeared ready to leap out of its clay podium any moment!
“This was my first attempt at sculpturing. I have never done anything of this sort before and I have had no training. I saw the workshop here and just thought let’s give it a try,” Laila tells Community.
Accompanied by her mother and younger siblings, the girl said she would now definitely like to further explore her creative side as she thoroughly enjoyed her first encounter.
Her mother said even she was surprised over her daughter’s hidden talent for art and sculpturing and did not expect the sculpture to come out so well. Laila, however, was able to respond to her artistic flank and that is exactly what the students of Stenden University’s Event Management Department wanted to achieve with their workshop that Laila, her family and many others like them, attended.
Held in collaboration with Katara Cultural village, patron of the event, at the Ramadan Festival, the 3-day ‘Youngsters Art Workshop’ was aimed at invoking creative side of those who had never tried to let the artist out of them.
The goal was to blend the concept of innovation within the theme of Islamic architecture and enhance youth’s ideas and motivation by giving them an opportunity to create, innovate and paint Islamic sculptures using several sculpting tools.
The event brought people together to socialise, create and innovate in the field of art and handicrafts. It mostly remained a family affair as both parents and their children were roped in to immerse themselves into the art of sculpturing.
“We are students of Stenden University in Qatar and we are doing our event minor, which is a sort of examination. This project was part of it. We had two different groups. One of these was in the ages 12-18 who painted and designed sculptures out of clay. Some of them were really good,” Isabel Coppenrath, one of the two Project Leaders from the event management course at Stenden University tells Community.
The participants were allowed to register as solo or in groups or if they had brothers and sisters accompanying them, then it became a complete family affair.
The other group which was bracketed in ages 18-25 had the opportunity to build their own sculptures out of clay. “They remained really busy with it and the idea was to make them feel free to plunge into the work of an artist and allow their minds to be creative,” said Isabel.
The event was designed to encourage the participants to uncover their hidden abilities. They had the opportunity to take their sculptures home and the event managers thought that would be much better than handing out any prize as children were really proud of their work and would want to keep them as a personal treasure.
The managers had seven students in their group and everyone had a certain role. They also had an artist at the workshop to help the participants build sculptures. He was responsible for instructing the older group in particular with their designs.
“The artworks by the audience could not have been done without the assistance of the Artist, Mustapha Abbour from Souk Waqif Art Centre, who contributed to the lively atmosphere,” said the team leader, adding the workshop attracted an audience of 70 people who enjoyed creatively designing and building gypsum and clay sculptures in Islamic architecture.
The sculptures designed by the children were mostly themed on Islamic architecture. Some of them came out with colourful nicely built Fanar buidings. “We wanted to create a certain interest for architecture for existing buildings here in Qatar and to let them interpret it in their own way,” said Isabel.
The young amateur artists were allowed to play with clay all by themselves. In one option, they were allowed to prepare the base with clay and then have the freedom to get away from the theme of Islamic architecture and build any building they wanted. Some of them opted for falcons.
“The idea was to make them feel free and do whatever was on their mind and to get in contact with how it works. Just today, I also started doing one sculpture and it was really hard. It does not seem that hard but it is,” said Isabel.
“However, the experience is worth it because when you go to an exhibition and see something out of clay, you think there is a lot of work in and you start appreciating it. And you actually know how much of hard work goes into something like this,” she added.
For the session of designing, they had seven sculptures and it was done in the group of three to four. In all, they received more than 70 people. Besides, there was a large number of little children who did the painting and designing alongside their older siblings involved in sculpturing.
“We are really excited to see that people really wanted to come in and showed huge interest in the activity and participated with complete devotion. It was a nice experience,” said Isabel.
Studying commercial economics, she is doing event management minor as a specialisation. Everyone in her group is doing minor here in Qatar as part of their grand tour programme at the University of Stenden in Holland.
The programme allows them to go and complete their minor at one of the University’s many campuses overseas and they have come to Qatar for one semester.
“After this event we will be done with our project and then we will go back to Holland,” said Isabel, adding that it was a great experience for her.
“It was a totally different culture and I enjoyed it a lot. I was kind of ready for it and expected it to be so and we felt really good here. We felt at home. The hospitality was really good,” said the workshop team leader.
Established in 2000, Stenden University offers a Bachelor course in International hospitality management and others. All bachelor courses are approved by the Supreme Council programmes in Qatar. The main branch of the university is located in Leeuwarden, The Netherlands. However, it has several branches around the world mainly in South Africa, Thailand, and Indonesia.
