Our Convent Kids programming in January with Slow Art Collective, Pavilion 2024, was a free immersive, participatory installation for children and their adults. Pavilion 2024 filled a niche in children’s programming, better attending to the specific needs of neurodivergent children or children with disabilities through its interactivity.
Pavilion 2024 reimagined the Convent’s gallery The Store, through a series of installations that invited active participatory multi-arts experiences, designed for children to roam, make and create an ever-evolving installation over nine days. Four artist-led workshops, delivered by Sarah Aiken, Lauren Sheree, Ngioka Bunda-Heath and Dan Newell, were also well attended.
The overall experience achieved a 93% audience satisfaction rating, and audiences engaged in the installation with an incredible depth – often staying for three hours or longer. Some families were repeat visitors, visiting the installation up to five times, and others staying for up to three hours. The depth of interest shown in the installation signalled a real need for this type of creative, participatory programming, and illustrated a hunger for audience-to-artist engagement.
Pavilion 2024 received generous support from Creative Australia, the Australian Government’s principal arts investment and advisory body. Our Convent Kids program relies on the support of our funding partners, and we are pleased to announce that our successful recent grant from the City of Yarra we enable us to continue curating and presenting a year-round program of impactful children’s programming at the Convent throughout 2024.
Our Convent Kids program fosters a lifelong involvement with the arts, through early-years engagement during a vital period of learning and development. We improve children’s educational outcomes by firmly placing children at the centre of arts and cultural activity, championing them as co-creators and active participants.
We received very positive feedback from the audience surveys.
Some comments:
- “Great sensory experience for neuro divergent kids thank you.”
- “It was very engaging for my 11-year-old as well as me. The collage workshop and the tennis ball marble runs were our favourites”.
- “Great for toddlers. Like that it’s interactive”
- “So good! An inspired, engaging and beautiful event.”
- “Great slow activities and nice staff.”
- “Interactive and not too busy.”
- “Kids loved to interact and create and experience. Thank you! Awesome!”
- “Great opportunity for the kids to create things, learn to weave and enjoy art.”
- “Kids had a blast! It’s a really interesting and fun experience for the family. You should do a lot more!”
- “Our kids loved it, we stayed for over an hour”.
- “Always great activities, the staff are great”.