Our Portland Project and Exhibit!

Classes are hard at work on their submissions for our Youth Program Exhibition in March. Art Explorers and Visual Elements started the project this last Saturday. Several students from Drawing Studio have completed their submissions for our Portland-centric exhibit. Check out this awesome piece that features our city’s stellar soccer team, the Portland Timbers. Click the jump to see more —> River City Art Exhibit

Clay Creatures

Our Art Explorers clay work has come out of the kiln! It looks awesome! Among other items that were fired: several houses, a bird, a few cats, and some crazy shapes that aren’t quite identifiable.

Landscapes with Amy Steel

Last Saturday, longtime instructor Amy Steel subbed for our Art Explorers class. She is an amazing educator and a good friend to the program. She coordinated with Wayne Bund on the lesson; an exploration of landscape using Ansel Adams as a reference point. Students looked at his photography and read a story that focused on silhouetted figures and shape. Our 4-6 cohort worked with sumi ink on watercolor paper to create really lovely black and white landscapes.

The final results can be seen below.

Self Portraits!

As usual, Saturday classes at PNCA were epic. Several projects are starting to come to a close as the end of the semester draws near. All of the classes are working on, or will start, their submissions to our 2012 exhibit which takes place in March. We will keep you posted on that project as the submissions are completed. In addition, our Drawing Studio class started a self portrait project this last week. We encourage students to draw from life, using mirrors as a reference. It’s always interesting to see how 7 and 8 year olds will depict themselves during an observed portrait assignment.

Online Exhibition - Fall 2011

We’re still a few weeks out from the conclusion of our Fall term, but artwork is already being uploaded and shared on Flickr from our current youth classes. There are some really lovely pieces of work in our exhibition sets. Hey, did you know that we have an exhibition archive that features work from the last 3 years of classes? It’s true. It’s a great way to see what a class with our program is like or explore the awesomeness that is kid-made-art. If you what to check out this term’s sets or sets from past classes just visit our Online Exhibition Archive on Flickr.

More from our Evening Classes

We are about 3-weeks out from the end of our Fall term. It’s hard to believe the time has gone by so quickly. Even so, our Instructors and students are making the most of that time in our classes by producing some great artwork! Artist and photographer Heather Zinger was nice enough visit campus last week, and take some very lovely photos of the goings on in Continuing Education. You can see more images from our classrooms by visiting our flickr site. If you would like to know what we will be doing next term you can visit our Registration site, or contact Continuing Education Staff directly.

On Drawing the Universe

On Saturday, as classes were starting I made my way to the Art Explorers room to check in. This is a sort of ritual for me since documenting classes, student performances, and artwork has become a part of my job in recent years. As usual, I took a seat in room 210, listening quietly as students talked with one another the way young children often do; one little girl commenting on how Wayne is nice, and waits for all the students to arrive before starting a project in his class. Another student mentioned that she was drawing her father. To my left, a student worked furiously in his sketchbook. He was making stars with marks in all directions, flipping pages and drawing circle after circle. Intrigued, I asked him, “What are you drawing?”

His answer, “Everything in the Universe.”

Above are images from his sketchbook that day… so this is what the universe looks like. Cool.

A visit to the Stagecraft Building.

Students in Wayne Bund’s Art Explorers class visited our 3D Building and Ceramic Studio this week. They ventured out of their regular classroom in our Goodman Building to glaze some recently fired sculptural work. After arriving to the space, Wayne gave a brief explanation of how a kiln works, and at what temperature their artwork was fired. The kids were quite impressed with how hot a kiln gets when it is firing at Cone 6. Students were then allowed to get close to, but not touch, a kiln in mid-fire to feel the heat emanating from it. Afterwords, students glazed their work and did a super awesome job cleaning the space once their class was complete!

Evening Classes at PNCA

Our Continuing Education Program has been up to a lot in recent weeks. Classes are moving right along and some great art is in the works. Check out more images from the classrooms of our current offerings at our Flickr Site. If you would like to learn more about upcoming classes, check out our Registration Site for more details. Big thanks to our good friend Wayne Bund for taking such lovely photos of Beginning Drawing: Perception Skills with Kurt Hollomon, Beginning Painting with Jerry Sumpter, and Web Design Tools with Sarah Schlosser Moon

Pre-College Painting Studio

The Pre-College Studios is still a few months away; July 16 to August 3. But we wanted to give you a preview of the type of work that comes out of our Program! Above is some stellar artwork from our Painting Studio with CE and BFA Instructor Benny Fountain.