What will my kids learn during the 2020 Summer Studios?
Maureen likes to tailor the summer to what the kids want to learn. When we all meet each other on our first day, we will finalize the schedule of topics for the 8 studio sessions w. We won’t get to everything on the list this summer, but if all goes well, we will have after-school studios for kids in the fall and winter, leading up to next year's 5th Annual Young Voices exhibit.
… because it makes everyone so happy and inspires us all to pay attention to the child-artist within. The third annual Young Voices art exhibit runs from February 2 through 19. Please join us for an opening reception with the artists on Friday, Feb 2 from 5 to 7pm.
Young Voices artists, ages 8 to 15, have taken art classes throughout the summer and many have continued with one-on-ones during the school year. Artists include Ema Terry, Adia Terry, Sophia Albright, Rachel Kuntz, Silas Fruge, Lilly Hamper and Scarlet Carpenter. (See photo albums below for some sneak peeks.)
Each young artist participates in the behind-the-scenes tasks of curating and mounting an art exhibit: from planning, promoting and mounting the exhibit to patching holes in the walls, writing artist statements, bios and short gallery talks – the lessons they learn are about life as well as art.
The student artists will be present during the opening reception to meet the public and give 1-minute gallery talks. This year we are showing sculptural works by the younger artists and plein-air paintings and drawings by the teens. You’ll be delighted and curious when you see the variety of techniques and creativity.
We encourage everyone to join us to support these young, brave creatives. Hope to see you Feb. 2nd, or if you can’t make it to the reception, please stop by the gallery to view the works between Feb 3rd and 19th.
Each year our Young Voices artists choose two or more local charities to receive donations from the sales of their artwork. In years past, they have donated to the Holter Museum of Art, Mountain Meadow Preschool and Green Arts Montessori School, The Friendship Center and the YWCA. 40% of all sales are given to these non-profits by the kids and the gallery. The rest goes to the kids and to pay the expenses of opening night.
Through your purchases of their art, you boost the young artists’ confidence and contribute much-needed funding to these charities. Watch for more details in our next “love letter” and on our social media posts. If you do not currently receive our email love letters (aka newsletters) and you want to, please subscribe/sign-up here.
By request of some of my older art students, I am trying something new this summer. It’s a series of plein-air drawing and painting classes for teens on eight Mondays. We’ll focus on learning to draw from life and nature, by observing carefully and practicing basic and more advanced skills.
Sketching, painting and a bit of photography
Landscapes and close-ups; rivers, mountains, trees and grass; people, bugs and birds; natural scenes and city scenes; wildflowers and seedpods
Watercolors, water-soluble pencils, pastels, graphite and pencils, ink pens, mixed-media, acrylic paint, charcoal and collage.
This year will be our Third Annual Young Voices Art Exhibit at 1+1=1 Gallery (sometime during the school year.) All four of my teen adventurer-artists will be able to participate in the preparation for the exhibit, at no charge. (Students’ families pay for inexpensive frames.)
Self portraits are a form of creative, artistic expression that dates back to the first mud-paintings on cave walls, and from classical painters and sculptors to contemporary artists. Most artists don’t create self portraits to sell. But it is an incredibly useful way to practice the arts of introspection, observance, self-knowledge and self-expression. For kids ages 9 to 13, introspection isn’t something they admit to doing regularly. I expected my students to be challenged, maybe uncomfortable, certainly pushed outside their comfort zones. They did some beautiful expressive work and I am sooo proud of them. Two students who could not attend today’s sesh will do this same project in one on ones with me later.
Watch for announcements and invitations to the 2nd Annual Young Voices exhibit opening November 8th where you will be able to see their artwork in person and meet the artists.
Today in our Kds Creativity Sesh we learned about self portraits and created two types of portraits.
First we watched a slideshow/collection of self portraits by artists both well known and unknown, including some by other students. Then we looked at some of the more unusual or creative self portraits and talked about why artists make self portraits and what they might be trying to express about themselves.
I gave my students an assignment to take lots of photos of themselves ( using a digital remote and an iPad on a stand) with the end result of 8 different emotional portraits. They chose their favorites to work with.
Next, the kids used either Photoshop or a mobile app to distill the color portraits to a black and white, posterized, sketch-ized or comic-ized image. We printed those on Bristol paper, glued them to very large sketch Bristol and they added paint and papers to create self portraits.
The students used some of the remaining expressive self-portrait photos to learn about enhancing the emotion of an image by the way one chooses to process the photo. Some of their photographic results are above.
Also, please check out some of their mixed-media self portraits below and let them know through comments, how you respond to their endeavors. Thank you!
Some of the photo-enhanced selfies:
We invite you to an opening reception of our upcoming exhibit, “Young Voices” on the evening of Oct. 30th, at 1+1=1 Gallery. Please come support these young artists, ages 9 to 13, in their first group exhibit in Helena.
Flub-ups, Oops and Leftovers Make Cool Collages
Sometimes one of my paintings or drawings just isn’t up to snuff… But that’s okay. It’s chill. I don’t worry and — I definitely don’t toss it! That’s like gold in the hands of a collage artist (that would be you, or your kiddo, in this fun class.)
I’m pretty excited to venture into doing my own classes for kids. I’m starting this year with once a week classes for 9 to 13 year olds. Next year, I will probably branch out to younger and older kids, especially if we have a gallery manager who can take over some of the work. [grin]
Energy movement, expression of form, creation of meaningful, new forms. Invented tools. Unique paint brushes. Drawing with found objects and natural materials. Creative. Expressive. Fun. Outside-the-box!
Our second Kids Creativity sesh for 9 to 13 year old kids, is all about abstract painting and mark-making. It’s about breaking out of the urge to paint like a photograph, or realistically. It’s about expressing the feelings we have, or the feeling of a thing. It’s one way to get away from, “I-can’t-draw-horses-that-look-like-horses-so-I’m-giving-up,” to “Oh! I love riding horses (riding my skateboard/climbing trees/swimming …) and I know how that feels! I can paint the way it feels!”
Boys and girls alike, will get into this boat-sculpture-making class. When we’re done with our boats, we’ll have a free, follow up morning when the students will learn about making an installation-art project in the front window of the gallery!
