Your Spirit Bird
BIRDS AS INSPIRATION
One of the best adapted animals on the planet are birds. They date back to the time of the dinosaurs so they’ve had lots of time to make those adaptations too. There are over 10,000 species that are critical to our ecosystem as pollinators, scavengers, hunters, and prey. But there is a spiritual dimension to humans relationship with birds, evidenced in numerous cultures throughout the world. An important one right here in our country is the Indian cultures who found birds to be inspirational on many levels. To many American Indian tribes, various birds symbolized freedom, strength, and courage. Many different species of birds were thought to have mystical powers. Often, tribes honored birds in their artistic creations such as the piece of Native American pottery below.
BIRD ART PROJECT: YOUR SPIRIT BIRD
For this activity, we celebrate our connection with birds in two forms of creative expression. First, we look through one of our bird books to refresh our eyes visually on the many shapes, patterns, and colors of birds. Then we close our eyes and relax like a meditation and Indian might do. We rest in this position until we begin to imagine our very own Spirit Bird. Granny softly guides us by asking questions about the field markings.
What color is your birds body?
How big is it?
What does the beak look like?
Does it have any unique patterns or stripes or markings?
What does the tail look like?
And so on.
Then we draw a picture of our Spirit Bird using markers, paint, colored pencil, pastels, glue glitter, jewels, fabric, whatever we need to properly represent this special creature.
Second, once we’ve brought our bird to the world on this sheet of paper, we meditate again. This is when we imagine the bird flying to us and giving us a special message. Then we write a story of our encounter with our Spirit Bird.
MY SPIRIT BIRD VIOLET
She is a purple bird with a crested head and purple everywhere with purple eyes. The wings are big. She is almost as tall as a parrot. It was on my bird feeder when I first saw her. She had a long, long crest on her head. The feathers were smooth and kind of soft looking. She is a girl bird and I sensed her name was Violet.
I could tell right away she glows. She can just come in anywhere and brightens the place to make it more sunny and nice.
As I close my eyes, I can see through her eyes. Right now she is flying around and then landing in a tree with her babies. One baby is all purple like her with goldenish eyes. The other one has a white toe and looks more pink than purple. One has flat feathers on its head and the other one has a pokey one like a crest.
Violet says that every time I walk into the forest, I will get a nice bird surprise. That is her gift to me from now on because she is my spirit bird. — by Lilly
SPIRIT BIRDS WITH A TWIST
Kallie and Roland went with their grandparents to the Art Preserve to see the behind the scenes storage facility for the Kohler Art Centers own collection. On the third floor was an island covered with amazing birds made of concrete and found elements. They decided to pick their spirit bird from this flock. Each stood by the island, slowly walking around the outer edges waiting for a sign from the aviary gods as to which one was meant to be theirs. Here’s how it turned out.
ROLAND’S SPIRIT BIRD
Her name, her powers, and details about her plans with Roland are classified. Be afraid.
KALLIE’S SPIRIT BIRD
This bird’s name cannot be spoken. As you can see, Kallie has already learned the power of levitation from her spirit bird. We always love to see kids broaden their skill sets.
