Using non-verbal tools in the community arts

As I write this piece, it feels I am developing further the ideas from To Community Artist: You Know More Than You Realize from a few weeks ago.

It is always easier to depend on the spoke language when researching and assessing the community arts. However, it is common knowledge that important things also happen non-verbally.

Because in the community arts, we are trying not to be ‘teaching’, ‘explaining’ or ‘directing’ with words, artists may use every other means to achieve similar goals. One can find such examples in cross-cultural settings.

Trips to Bangalore, India

First time there, I was assisting visual artist Thomas to lead children to do some collaborative work. We started unprepared in a classroom setting, where the strict teacher seems to have commanded quietly seated students to copy whatever we drew on the blackboard. The entire vibe, classroom set up, teacher and children’s expectations were top-down and one-way.

So we decided to change the room setting, combining children’s desk for them to collaboratively draw a lovely mess of a tree trunk, and then simply leave the classroom (and teacher supervision) and completed the leaves on a nearby wall.

For our 3rd trip, we recruited a multi-talented artist/production guy who had zero confidence in his minimal English (which was not useful anyhow with very poor locals). He had a few warm up games up his sleeves that did not require verbal instructions, and his enthusiasm was felt by the locals.

Non-verbal tools we use

So off the top of my head, here is a list of things we do other than using words:

• Set up the room in all its details of chairs, tables, lighting, decor, placements, temperature…
• Our attires
• Putting our personal belongs in a certain place
• Take off our shoes
• Play music
• Wait at the door
• Smile, or not in some cases
• Look people in the eyes
• Calm ourselves
• Exaggerate body movements and expressions
• Slow down or speed up
• Bring people together or set them apart
• Mingle with people or stay away from people before the start

Our eyes leading the way

Looking at this list, I must say that the eyes are our most powerful single channel of communication with our participants. You see, in our Bangalore trip, we were holding mini activities at orphanages, hospital words and temporary estates. We had little control over the setting and the external environment, and we simply wore what functional clothes we brought there.

Yet, we tried to be present wherever we went, starting from the moment when we jump off a cramped van after an hour of traffic jam; and it showed through our eyes.

Along with this sense of presence, we gesture, sound and relate to people in ways that communicate without words.