Alumna Liz McDonough on Creating in Rural Greece
Elizabeth McDonough, an alumna of Carnegie Mellon University’s School of Design (MA ‘22), spent a summer week at an intensive creative workshop off the beaten path in the Mani region of Greece, near Kalamata. This creative design residency was put on by Periplus Workshops which aims to “positively affect the present and future…through innovatively enhancing pre-existing potential, fostering local community motivation, organizing creative forums and festivals, and enabling the infiltration of design-thinking into all key sectors of society.” Periplus offers two workshops: Form and Light. McDonough participated in Light with 11 other international participants from London, Singapore, Germany, Italy, Japan, China.
“We spent a week experimenting with light and shadow as tools for communicating a narrative,” explained McDonough. “We worked solo and collaboratively to create objects, effects and sounds using organic materials we found in the olive grove with the help of some modern tools. Our theme ended up being about women, specifically telling the story of the role of women in Greece but also acknowledging the similar struggles women face across cultures and geographic locations.”
McDonough and her fellow creatives were fully immersed in nature and the local culture. After about a 10 minute drive off the main road on a windy, dirt road, the Periplus cohort arrived at their accommodations for the week: a villa nestled in an olive grove.
“They woke us up every morning at 7:30 by walking through the house shaking goat bells,” said McDonough. During the day, distant goat bells continued and feral cats bathed in patches of sun. “As dusk approached you could hear people yelling to each other across the hills and we would sometimes yell back.”
“Every meal was vegetarian and thoughtfully curated to tell a story about the local culture,” she recounts. The cohort experienced typical meals of those working on an olive grove, as well as meals that might be served at special events.
The members of the workshop worked solo and collaboratively to create objects centered around the theme of Light. They then use those objects in a group performance to showcase to the local community. McDonough explains her contributions.
“I created a spinning city to use to situate the audience in our location. I made a concrete base and stuck in pieces of discarded tile from the olive grove. It was also sitting on a pottery wheel so it could spin and therefore the shadow would be more dynamic – when you cast light through it, it looked like crumbling buildings jutting out. It bore a clear resemblance to Vatheia, a local city of towers that had been abandoned.”
McDonough contributed through multiple creative disciplines, including sound.
“I also ended up being the percussionist of the group and created sound for our performance – I made a maraca using papier mache with flour and water as my glue, paint I made from charred wood, and I filled it with seeds from a native tree along with discarded bits from our meals like olive pits, peach pits, etc. I also made a maraca-style glove using the same seed pods from the native tree.”
McDonough describes a few items that weren’t present for the final performance, though part of the overall creative process.
“There were a few other things I experimented with that I didn't end up using – a bird's nest, I tried to plaster a rock to create a mold, and I crocheted some rocks and hung them on a stick to play with shadow.”
The workshop culminated in a performance and discussion with the community. It took place on the night of a new moon, emphasizing the power of light during a dark night. “Our final performance was in the schoolyard of an old kindergarten in a town called Kardamyli and people from the town attended – afterward we had a cocktail hour to talk to the locals about what we made.”
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Elizabeth McDonough is a Designer and Creative Storyteller. She is currently an Experiential Marketing Manager at Urban Outfitters.