Learning in Playful Environments

I got lucky, once, when teaching a Literature class about point-of-view. My friend Mark Friedlander had made an art installation which showed what I was struggling to tell. I took my class to the gallery and invited them to engage with Mark’s work. It was plywood, like a packing case, about two meters high and a meter square. On two sides were tiny holes. If you walked up and put your eye to a hole, you saw into a miniature white corridor illuminated from above. It was like looking into the start of a labyrinth; your imagination was invited into the possibilities of a space where your physical body couldn’t go. Mark Friedlander You can see some later iterations of Mark’s work here . It strikes me now that Mark’s box was a lot like the way I think about poetry: it was a space for the viewer/reader to make meaning. Many meanings were possible but all were bounded by Mark’s manipulation of the space - his crafting of the materials and his manipulation of the light source. Tonight I have ...

Sunday night in Singapore Primitive people, so I’m told, Feared photography because It stole their soul. In civilised countries, Like Singapore and Australia Kalashnikov cameras Shoot holes in everything - Capturing images Like there’s no tomorrow.