There is a short verbal exchange on what took place. The object and the process of creating it are re-felt and incorporated. This exchanging is done many times the series is closed by bringing the object to our forehead and observing it from a distance, from real close by. After lunch we are each given a piece of clay that we roll into a ball and with which we connect in various ways: we hold it in our hands and feel it with eyes closed, we throw it in the air and catch it in different ways in pairs and with closed eyes we knead it into a form that we hand to our partner at the signal ‘exchange.’ Silently we ‘feel through’ the object we receive and continue working on it. Soon all awareness of time and hour disappears, replaced by crystal-clear attention and an open space in which the unexpected can take place. The ‘old hands’ tell us how different is each drawing made in this way, showing each group’s ‘soul’ to be unique. It is fascinating to see everyone’s responses, and to find how as a group almost instantly we form some kind of ‘body,’ a whole that is more than the sum of its parts. In so doing we run into our conditionings regarding ‘me and mine,’ (in)tolerance of what others are adding, the taking and passing on of our turns. A kind of dance begins, in which one after another, sometimes two at a time, piece of charcoal in each hand, we participants draw our traces, witnesses of an inner movement that wasn’t known until this very moment, leaving marks of a highly individual ‘us-ness.’ We produce a drawing for all of us, yet possessed by no-one. This is to be a day outside the confines of time! We seat ourselves in a semi-circle in front of the easel. So it’s to the virgin sheet of paper we go, that is, after a short self-introduction, a movement-exercise and, last but not least, the putting away of our watches. Today we will experience the working of it all, hands-on. Catering to the latter group, the beautifully styled book-cum-video ‘The timeless Hour’ shows Michiel’s approach in 22 exercises that can be followed by schoolteachers wanting to link art-work and inner development.Īpplying these exercises opens a way for children to get to know their ‘inner images’, allowing an interweaving of perception and experience.The exercises stimulate intuition and help children to become ‘complete’ human beings. Michiel’s students are adults as well as primary school children. This starts a process that will integrate the working of both hemispheres of the brain, release tension, lead to awareness of one’s creativity, enhance body-awareness, balance ‘felt senses’ and mental-cognitive powers. Michiel, artist and musician, works with silence and movement, has students alternate between the dominant and non-dominant hand when drawing, use both hands at the same time, insist they don’t only knead clay but also feel and sense it, has objects change hands many times while being ‘worked on.’ The remarkable images that are the fruit of his approach, cannot but make one curious as to what it is that brought them about. All is ready for a day of drawing called ‘the Timeless Hour.’ĭuring many years of working with students of all ages Michiel Dhont has developed a series of exercises aimed at developing ‘unity of head, heart and hands.’ The place radiates frugality and a sense of purpose. On the floor a circle of meditation-pillows. An easel carries a large board, a fresh sheet of paper tacked onto it. Participants help themselves to coffee or tea. Isitor to a spacious loft under the beams of a roof-construction in which the shipbuilding-techniques of a past era were used a vessel turned upside down. A maze of staircases and corridors eventually leads the v ‘Atelier Werkplaats Molenpad in Amsterdam / painting session from movement and intuition’. It turns out to be situated in a large old building in a nondescript back-street off Amsterdam’s famous hot spot, the Leidseplein. It is a bit of a search to find Michiel Dhont’s workplace ‘Werkplaats Molenpad’. Inner Images coming to life: The timeless hour in elementary schools.Įnglish translation of an article published in the Dutch magazine ‘Educare’, year 19, nr.
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