Tours and workshops your child will surely enjoy!

Alexander Calder Stabiles New York City is an amazing resource for modern and contemporary art! As a fine artist, as well as an art teacher of children for 15 years, I have found the question, “What is Art?” a never-ending one.  Hence my goal- to demystify artists and their processes in language children can understand and adults can use.  Art-making is full of choices, which builds a stronger child having made them.  I founded Claire’s Creative Adventures over 12 years ago to explore the processes of artists which children may encounter in museums, galleries, or on a walk and to have the tools to decipher and imagine what the artists are thinking.  Developing these critical thinking skills and imagination is paramount to a well-rounded child who may approach all of their endeavors with such joy and confidence as they do art!

Becoming a learner with your child can be a stimulating experience!  In these workshops and tours, adults learn age-appropriate art language and directed questions as well as techniques artists use to create.

Upcoming Museum Adventures Tours:

December 6th, 2013  Impressionism for Kids and Families. (Register by Dec. 3rd.  Limited spaces.)  Ages 6-12 years.
1:30-2:45pm/ 3:45-5pm

January 10th, 2014  Line, Shape and Balance. Create a Calder and David Smith, exploring texture & line with metal & wire.  (Register by Jan. 7th.  Limited spaces.) Ages 3-12 years.
1:30-2:45pm/ 3:45-5pm

@ The Metropolitan Museum of Art  (This is a private group.)

        • 1.25 Hours of specialized museum time for children ages 3 -12 (3-9 kids at a time.)
        • Unique take-home tour art projects with a wide variety of materials and a gift bag.
        • Tour artist & leader for the adventure!
        • Includes multiple projects with myriad materials and a tote bag.

2 Parent-Child Workshops:

Dec. 7th Parent-Child Venetian Mask-Making, create a disquise for NYE!  (Register by Dec. 4th.  Limited spaces.) Ages 5-12 years.

Create the perfect disguise for any party or just to decorate and hang!  During this class, these striking Venetian masks will become colored, adorned with myriad feathers and jewels and able to wear!  Both parent and child will make their own mask.

Jan. 11th Parent-Child DALI Clock-Making in Metal!  (Register by Jan. 8th.  Limited spaces.) Ages 6-12 years.

Join Artist Claire Munday to create your very own Dali-inspired functioning clock! Using embossing techniques on metal, clocks will be designed and constructed to reflect the “melting” of Dali’s works.

@ All Souls Church, 1157 Lexington, 10075

Damien Hirst-Inspired Halloween Fun!

I’ve been wanting to do this Damien Hirst kids project for a few years, it just took a while to get it down for both the very young hands to feel successful, as well as to engage older kids. What worked well was that they could add as many details as they wanted, or work for a little while and still have a nice piece to take home. A lot of prep work though! But all worth the excitement it created, and the imaginations it inspired.

Homemade Costumes: Parents Who Went the Extra Mile!

Jack’s fascination with transportation left his parents in a difficult situation.  Are front-loaders sold at costume shops?  WW1 fighter planes?

My mother used to sew our costumes, but who does that anymore?  Well, you don’t necessarily have to… These creative parents decided to BUILD them. Cardboard is easily found, but as Jack’s parents concluded, making correct armholes so that Jack could maneuver his candy-gathering was of utmost importance.

Way to go Jack for being relentless in your costume dreams! … and he’s only 6! Perhaps the fact that Jack’s dad worked for the MTA had something to do with it?

By the way, these costumes even articulate!  I’m so excited to see this year’s costume:  The Intrepid!

 

 

This Sat. 4pm… Movie Set-Making for Kids and Adults!

Register now: Art Adventures Parent-Child class Sat. Nov. 2nd from 4-5:30 pm. ClairesCreativeAdventures.com

We are so excited to have professional scenic artist Cliff Gokenbach teach us the secrets of how artists create for the movies.  He can’t tell us about the new Spiderman he’s working on, but he can help us make any imaginary set we can dream of!  Here, he’s gone to Venice…

Venetian Mini-Set 2Venetian Mini-Set

This Friday 3:45pm: Children Can Experience Color & Mood w. Impressionists @ the Met w. Hands-On Projects!

Post Halloween blues?  This Friday from 3:45-5pm, kids can create Monet’s mood through color, Van Gogh’s swirling lines in metal and hide Rousseau’s animals in the jungle… In our Friday Met Children’s Tour, ages 6 and up.   Artists of all ages will love the projects and come home with a goodie bag…. full of art!  Not candy!  (Adults welcome to participate.)

Visit www.ClairesCreativeAdventures.com/register

Van Gogh Embossing

Creating the Perfect Disguise at our Venetian Mask Party

At our Venetian Mask Party (great for all ages,) we adorned our own Venetian Masks with jewels, feathers, and so much more.

Take a peek at how we dazzle in our disguises!

What can your child learn on a Gallery Walk?

In our quest to discover “What is Art?”, CCA visited some wonderful kid-friendly galleries you should know about.   These galleries are in such close proximity and offer a wealth of exposure to a wide range of modern and contemporary artists.  Along the way, our kids learned to direct their questions to the gallery owners, chose their favorite pieces, made sketches as well as articulate their “likes” and “dislikes” using the 7 elements of art to justify their choices.

2013-09-26 16.56.29

First stop was Isabel Bacher Gallery on 78th @ Madison, were we met our most enthusiastic and gracious gallery owner, Audrey.  I would highly recommend a visit here to see a wide range of prints and printing processes of the masters like Toulouse Lautrec, Miro, Chagall, Matisse, Picasso, Dubuffet and Warhol.  They are simple enough to sketch and bring colored pencils for Miro!

Just next door are the gorgeous Lady M Cakes.  What a great introduction to food painters and builders such as Claes Oldenburg and Wayne Thiebaud!

1018 Madison Avenue galleries are great because you can hit a few all in one building… and see gorgeous desserts at the front door!  Our kids were able to discover that they liked works from Jean Arp, Gorky, Chamberlain (they were able to relate it to the piece we have seen at the Met!) as well as a new artist to us:  Jeane Plensa who uses words & symbols as art in a marvelous 3D form.  Mark Swanson’s bejeweled antlers were hard not to touch… but our 3 feet rule helps when reaching outJ

Saving the best for last was the Michelle Rosenfeld Gallery on 79th street.  Cecelia greeted us at the door and showed us works by Kwang Young Chun (a fave for the kids), Murakami, Calder and even a surprising Yayoi Kusama.  They were extremely inviting and wonderful with the kids.

2013-09-26 17.52.02

All in all, it was an eye-opening first day of the semester, lending an opportunity for me as a teacher to know where to drive our curriculum down the road, to revisit and demystify these artist’s works & processes, while promoting further understanding of the art world around us.  As always, check first to make sure the works are child-appropriate, as they consistently change.

Join us on our tours, and discover for yourself how rewarding it is to see and make art from the contemporary greats!

This Saturday 4pm: Parent/Child Disguise-Making for Halloween!

This Saturday, October 5th:

Create your own Venetian Mask!
4-5:30pm
1st Saturdays Parent-Child Workshop

Are you ready for Halloween?
Come create a Venetian mask that you can wear with style while trick-or-treating! Ages 5 and up should carve out time for this easy way to make an authentic-style disguise.

REGISTER TODAY!

Venetian Mask

 

This Friday & Sat: Be inspired by the Impressionists! Join now.

Join Museum Adventures and Discover the Impressionists @ the Met!

This Friday, October 4th @3:45-5pm
This Saturday, October 5th @1-2:15pm
Ages 6 and up

REGISTER TODAY!
(Minimum 3 children per tour)

Tours include hands-on diverse materials, on site at the museum.

Monet Impressionism

Discover the Impressionists on Oct 4th

Are your curious about the Impressionists?
Don’t know where to begin?
Explore Modern/Contemporary/Impressionist art with Claire Munday & see why and how to select works that are important to share with your children!

Join us Friday, October 4th @3:45-5pm. Register here: http://dev.clairescreativeadventures.com/register/

Renoir