In order to allow as many people as possible to participate, local artists can organize community work days. Submit your event information for our local listing.
Find a venue:
A home studio, school, church, college studio or community art center will do.
Gather materials and equipment:
Invite Your Community:
Use FB, word of mouth, email or old fashioned invitations.
To make objects based on stories, organizers have two choices:
1. Pull up our database of stories. Find the one that resonates with you. For each object you make, inscirbe the number of the story on the object. You could use one story for many objects or make an object for each story you select.
2. Have participants make objects based on their own story. Have them write out a story of a way their life has been affected by politics (read some stories or check out the resource section for inspiration). Submit stories ahead of time. We’ll upload and assign them numbers. Next, have each participant make a small object based on their story and inscribe their story’s number into it. (Here are some helpful guidelines put together by one of our collaborators.)
Each object should be small enough to fit in someones palm. All objects will need a quarter inch hole or sturdy loop to place the project-canary-tags1(PDF).
Tag the objects:
Use our project-canary-tags1 (PDF) or make your own (you can also edit our word document project-canary-tags1). The tags need to let the finder know they can keep the art, direct them to search for the story on projectcanary.org, and ask them to share their find on social media using #projectcanary, #projectcanaryfind, #nationalclayweek and tag us on Instagram and Facebook.
Make a drop plan for the next official drop day or the day of your choice:
Leaving art in public places for others to find is not illegal and there is a growing movement called “art abandonment”. As always, use common sense and don’t place the objects anywhere that someone could find them threatening. We recommend public and appropriate places such as parks, libraries, school courtyards or downtown. One of our collaborators lives in a town which is a state capitol. The capitol campus has a huge garden and she plans to drop some art objects there. If you attempt to drop an object and someone objects, just move along to another location.
Note on safety:
Unfortunately we recognize that, even if you do everything right, some folks may run into suspicion or worse because of their race, gender identity or perceived immigration status (and on and on). Please take care out there, be aware of your surroundings and err on the side of caution. If you feel like you can’t fully participate for fear of safety, reach out to us! We’ll try to connect you with folks in your area that you can work in coalition with. Also, consider sharing your story.
Project Canary 