Expressive Art AGM

Wow! What a night and an event that was particularly challenging! I was recording for the Annual General Meeting of an Ontario-wide organization, The Ontario Expressive Art Therapy Association. I had done recordings before in that building and was counting on a smooth wall. Instead, the room they held the AGM in was a perfectly lovely choice, but one that was a graphic recorder’s worst case scenario, and as a professional I should have calculated for such a possibility. It was a charming oak-paneled side room in a century-old building, with a large fireplace on one side and a bay window on the other. And the people in the attendance were wonderful therapists and artists! What is a graphic recorder to do? I decided to wing it. I chose one of the two heavy oak doors, which was also paneled, as half of my surface. The other half would be the beveled and paneled wall. With no real reliable surface at all beneath the paper, I chose light, brush style pens that made a mark no matter what. Since I could not use the usual sweeping, bold or stronger strokes of the pen, I integrated colored chalk and laid it on. Arrows and enclosures that might normally have had a single drop-shadow received a rainbow of colors instead. The final effect? They loved it! Well, they were Art Therapists! And I think they could tell that I had thrown my heart into it. The recording did actually have a wild, spirited quality to it that makes me laugh when I see it. Here’s me posing in front of the mural. It was an honour to work with the Ontario Expressive Art Therapy Association, and to be appreciated for my zany graphic recording of their AGM! Thanks, OEATA!