Inventgenuity Festival 2022: Event Recap

Thank you to everyone who attended our annual Inventgenuity Festival on Governors Island! During our two-day family-friendly festival, youth and their families participated in workshops hosted by Beam Center and our guest organization, the Lewis Latimer House Museum. Participants enjoyed performances organized and performed by youth from another partner organization, Building Beats.

In addition to all of our workshops and performances, we were joined by artist Xinan Ran for the official opening of Tree Chuang, this year’s Beam Project Governors Island that was built by youth at Beam Camp City. The six textile sculptures are now open to the public on Governors Island and will remain open through October 2022. Workshops led by Beam were inspired by projects built at Beam Camp City and Beam Camp. Check out some of the workshops youth participated in during the Festival.

BEAM WORKSHOPS

Cyanotype Portraits: Participants created portraits of their family members using found objects and a collection of random materials like metal rings, leaves, sticks, and more on a light-sensitized blue fabric. Once they were done creating faces, they brought it out to the sun and left it there for the portraits to react to the light. Afterwards, each portrait was rinsed in water allowing the portraits finish developing before then participants hung them up to dry.

Environmentally Triggered Rube Goldberg Machines: At this workshop youth were able to explore the interconnectedness of the environment and the far-reaching effect of small changes as they designed their very own Rube Goldberg machines. The goal was to create machines triggered by environmental stimuli like light, sound, movement, and more. During the workshop youth either created a new Rube Goldberg machine or continued from where the previous group left off.

The Big Little Camp Project: Participants made their own miniature stalagmites and stalactites and contributed them to collaboratively created a scale model of As Above, So Below, this year’s big project at Beam Camp.

Little Big Camp Project

Circle Rules Football

Circle Rules Football: While some were participating in the tabletop workshops, others joined staff members and campers from Beam Camp to play Circle Rules Football. Circle Rules Football is a theatrical and more creative approach to sports, mixing aspects from soccer, basketball, and volleyball, among others. A staple of every camp experience at Beam, we wanted to share this game with the public.

Drum Robots: Inspired by a project designed for recent teacher professional development sessions, this workshop taught participants how to create recording robots using arduinos. They also created their own motorized drumming instruments, then recorded the music they created on their robots.

GUEST WORKSHOPS

Participants were also able to participate in some cool workshops led by Lewis Latimer House Museum and artist Xinan Ran, Beam Camp City’s project designer.

TinkerLab Table with Lewis Latimer House Museum: Lewis Latimer House Museum education staff led a workshop where participants were able to experience their Young Inventor's Discovery Table, full of sensory materials, artsy projects, and things to build. Youth built figures out of legos and clay and also painted with Lewis Latimer House Museum staff.

Stamped Handkerchiefs: Participants had a lot of fun creating their very own unique patterns on a handkerchief using stamps they made out of wood and foam. Designed by the artist behind Tree Chuang, Xinan Ran, this technique was used during Beam Camp City.

PERFORMANCES

Music by Building Beats: Youth from Building Beats entertained Festival-goers during two separate performances on Saturday. The first performance featured songs performed by youth participants, while the second featured some live DJ sets. The crowd loved it so much it ended in a dance party!

Open Mic: Beam hosted a family-friendly Open Mic session on Sunday, where participants performed spoken word pieces and read poetry.

Finally, we’d like to say a special thank you to everyone who donated to Inventgenuity Festival 2022 and our work with young people. With your support, we had a wonderful festival and are looking forward to our next year of programming. We’d also like to extend our gratitude to Con Edison for their generous support of the festival and our ongoing work across NYC.

And now begins the countdown to Inventgenuity Festival 2023!