Stone Soup

In our DES001 class, we discussed “Stone Soup,” a folk story by Marcia Brown. In the story, travelers fill up a pot with water, drop a stone in the pot, and put the pot over a fire. Villagers come across it and begin to fill the pot with different seasonings and foods that mix in the pot. What starts out to be just a pot of water turns into a delicious pot of soup.

This concept was introduced in our design groups. We all brought in whatever we could find to class the following session so we could create or “design” a piece of art. We were placed into groups of eight people and were told to create this piece of imagination from only what we had brought.  We were forced to think outside the box and utilize only what we had to get the job done.

In my group, we first jotted down some ideas so we would have some sort of idea of what we were going to create. We ended up using the biggest piece of material, a postal service box, as the foundation of our “design.” As we began to decorate it we found that we had something forming. We noticed that what we were creating looked very similar to a bus. We continued to work with that concept and kept piecing things together and kept adding materials to the box so it would look like a bus and still have some character. We used colorful paper to wrap the box, cut toilet paper cartons for wheels, and used construction paper for doors and windows. We also put together a swimming pool and set it on top of the bus and added star stickers to build character. It was very nice to see every one working together, not just having one leader making demands. We used everybody’s input and ideas and were not hesitant to add anything from those suggestions. It was a very fun experience because there aren’t many classes that would allow us to think outside of the box and create things.

This experience reminded me of kindergarten where we created things without planning and put things together without having to think about what was going to happen next. If you felt it was right, it just happened. It was a great process of imaginative learning, and brought me back to my youth.