2012

Farewell from the Art Bikers of 2012

HEY YOU GUYS!! Thanks to everyone who came out and had a creative-silly-dancey-pretendy-crafty-arty-fun-time with us this summer. We've had the best summer ever and it's all thanks to YOU! Keep on being creative and involved in your communities and we'll see you all next summer. It's been a BLAST!!

Love Always,
The Art Bikers
(Tara, Dan, Jacob, Claire and Leah)

Urban Art Fun Times

To test out our newly acquired stenciling and urban art skills, the Art Bikers traveled to Creighton Park on August 23rd to make small fence murals. We met some real characters to create beautiful murals with and had a great afternoon in this hidden gem of a playground. Check out the finished products in Creighton Park!

Mulgrave Magic!

On August 21st and 22nd, the Art Bikers had the pleasure of visiting Mulgrave Park to have some fun with their Mulgrave Magic program. Together we made loads of cool decorations and pinatas for their upcoming community event, Mulgrave Days. We had a blast hanging out with these creative and awesome youths and we really hope to see everyone again soon! Special shout outs for the delicious 'chicken and waffles' lunch- you guys are the best.

Leah's Birthday Fun Times

HAPPY BIRTHDAY LEAH!! To celebrate our very own Art Biker's birthday, we went to Ardmore Park and had a dress-up-movie-dance-party-fun-time! We made costumes of all shapes and sizes and proceeded to film a movie featuring dragons, fairies, porcupines, spiderman, dancing queens, unicorns and much much more! The movie is being currently being assembled and will grace the world wide web shortly. Thanks for coming out and having the BEST TIME EVER!

Our Adventure to Musquodoboit Harbour

This week, our adventurous spirits took us all the way out to Musquodoboit Harbour! We participated in the second annual Eastern Shore Summer Arts Festival and made a gigantic 3D community map of Musquodoboit Harbour. Everyone pitched in by making different buildings, monuments, boats, whales, and even mermaids! We had a great time meeting lots of new and entertaining friends. Thanks to everyone who came out and make our map look almost as good as the real Musquodoboit Harbour.

Spontaneous Mobile Construction @ Bayers Westwood

On Wednesday, August 15th, we went out to Bayers Westwood for some spontaneous mobile making! We brought a bunch of awesome wood shapes (ie, scraps!) and a few buckets of paint. We had a blast, and the finished project is installed for all to see outside of the Bayers Westwood Family Resource Centre!

Come Glow With Us: Art Bikers @ Spryfield Urban Farm

On Tuesday evening, we were invited back to the Spryfield Urban Farm to lead a lantern making activity! We re-purposed old glass mason jars and decorated them with tissue paper, cool magazine cutouts, and loads and loads of glitter! We then led a procession through the garden with everyone holding their candle-lit lanterns, and finally, hung them up in a big twisty old maple tree.

Space Day!

Today we went back to Bayers Westwood, this time to go to SPACE! Everybody made telecommunicators, space head-wear, and high-tech gadgets galore, and before we knew it, we were all astronauts! We built our space-ship as a team and took off to explore space. BLAST-OFF!

Art on the Fence at Ardmore!

We've had a lot of positive feedback about the imaginative faces on the Ardmore Park fence created by 'Art Bikers and friends' years ago, so we wanted to give some more artists a chance to add to the installation! We painted and assembled some wonderfully wacky friends to join the existing art on the fence. We look forward to seeing this art remain a staple of the park for years to come, and maybe even continue to be added to by future Art Bikers and friends! If you created some of the faces with us on Wednesday, drop by Ardmore to see them displayed!

Dinosaur Day!

ROOAAAARRRRR!!!! DINOSAUR DAY!!

On July 23rd, we went back to hang out with our friends at Bayers Westwood. Except this time, we were all dinosaurs! We had a full day of dinosaur activities including curating a dinosaur museum, making a dino mural, creating skeletons which were then excavated from millions of years of fossilization, documenting our discoveries in notebooks, and finally EXPLODING A VOLCANO! We had a BLAST! Literally.

Splashy Painty Fun!

On July 19th, we went to Isleville Park to have the paintiest and messiest day of them all! We found a whole lot of enthusiastic kids to join us in our painty celebrations. We left behind a beautiful "art gallery" on the fence for all to see. Come check it out and don't be afraid to get messy and have FUN!



Birds in Paradise!

Birds in Paradise at the Urban Farm of Spryfield!

It was a hot ride, but the beautiful destination was incredibly worth it! We set up in the serene setting of the Urban Farm after getting a great little tour from Kat (the coordinator there) and took a few breaths to enjoy the sights and sounds of nature and to climb the amazing tree in which we were going to install our mobile. We taught participants a variety of origami bird patterns which we folded using 'waterproof' mylar that we had spraypainted in different colours and patterns. We also gathered twigs to paint as added natural elements and made hoops from branches found around the property. The components were installed among the branches of the tree, and although it was difficult to capture on camera, the result was so pretty.

Thanks UFS, for a lovely evening and thanks everyone for coming out to participate!

Come Weave With Us!

On July 17th the Art Bikers got to be guests at Spryfield Urban Farm's 'Evening in the Garden'! We spent a relaxing evening creating natural weaves using branches for looms, twine, and lots of beautiful yarns, strings, and fabrics. The end result was a fascinating collaboration by entire families and gardeners of all ages. When we were finished we hung the large and colourful creations on the Youth Garden fence. Come check it out at the Spryfield Urban Farm, and while you're at it, buy some of their delicious produce!

Magic Day

The 16th was MAGIC DAY!! It was our first Monday at Ardmore Park, where we'll be every two weeks from now on. Everyone who came to do art with us turned out to have magical powers, so it worked out really well! First we made magic wands and tested out some spells (everyone knew lots of them)! Then we wrote down and illustrated our spells in spell books, and drew what our magical familiars would look like. Finally we were ready to test out some potions! Every wizard chose two magical ingredients, like Frog Spit and Beetle Eyes or Worm Guts and Diamond Dust, and mixed them together to create an explosive, bubbly, magic concoction! ALAKAZAM!

Placemaking Halifax Intersection Repair

On July 14th, the Art Bikers visited the Placemaking Halifax Intersection Repair project at the corner of Northwood and Black St. This amazingly collaborative community beautification project was co-sponsored by the 4Cs Foundation (the Art Bikers' parent foundation) and was a huge success! The Art Bikers were honoured to be invited to do some chalk drawing on a side-street while the intersection was being painted. We drew the longest hopscotch in the world (101 squares!) with some very creative helpers!

North End Community Garden - Weaving Edition

Friday the 13th turned out to be a LUCKY day for the Art Bikers because we got to hang out some with some cool guys and gals and create some creative interpretations of the North End Community Garden! Everybody wove their own garden plot using lots of amazing different textures and fabrics, then learned how to felt whatever vegetables and fruit they wanted to be growing in their plot. The finished plots (with veggies attached!) will be sewn together, to hang as a beautiful community tapestry in the North End Community Health Centre. With the games we played at lunch, some dance moves and swivel-chair races, cheesy pizza and salad fresh from the Community Garden, it was a perfect day!

Beach Day!

The Art Bikers hit the beach yesterday for our first "medium day" ever! We brought a cart full of PAPER and made some amazing creations using only paper, scissors, tape and glue. It was awesome to see how creative everyone can be with only a box full of simple supplies. The artists made paper planes, paper dolls, origami, fortune tellers, paper crowns, flipbooks, cards, paper collages, cut-outs, snow flakes, paper boats, sun prints, and many other original creations! WOW! There were a lot of creative artists hanging out at the beach. Who knew?!

Puppet Fun Times

On July 9th the Art Bikers visited Bayers Westwood again, for their first community barbeque of the summer! It was held outside the Family Resource Centre, and there was a great turn-out. Everyone got to eat hotdogs and also make PUPPETS! Wood spoon puppets, pop-up puppets, sock puppets, paper bag puppets, hand puppets, face puppets...we saw it all! Finished puppets (and their creative owners) put on plays in a homemade puppet theatre for a very appreciative audience.

Canada Day Art Biker LAUNCH TOUR!

It's finally July, and that means the Art Biker season has officially begun! We celebrated our launch by donning silly costumes and visiting as many locations as possible on such a hot day. From the Spring Garden Library parade route to Alderney Landing and all the way back to the Commons, we got a chance to make art with tons of aspiring artists. By the end of the day we had a 100-ft bunting banner, with each unique bunting handcrafted by a different artist! We'll be taking it everywhere we go this summer, so keep your eyes peeled. If you missed us on our launch tour, check out our Calendar of Events to see when we'll be visiting a park near you this summer!