Tuesday, May 16, 2006

My Inspiration


Every Tuesday, The Wichita Art Museum provides a class for preschoolers called Art Start. There's only one theme per month, so you only go once during the month and today was our day! I love this activity, it's the sort of thing I would have eaten up as a child and I can only hope that Judah appreciates it.
Our walk into the museum isn't complete without a friendly stop at the buffalo sculpture.

Once we're in, Ms. Courtney, gives Judah a name tag and has us wait to go into the gallery until all the kids have arrived.

The children are lead to a particular artwork and they discuss what they see. Today's piece was Faith Ringgold's, Sunflower Quilting Bee. When Ms. Courtney asked about what we knew about sunflowers, Judah chimed in, "eat them." Not what she was going for, but he was completely right! We followed the discussion with the normal protocol, a book. Today was, S is for Sunflower, A Kansas Alphabet. It's always humbling when I learn a lot from these stories. I was amazed about all the little facts this kid's book included that I didn't know. Did you know Langston Hughes lived in Kansas?..... Well, Judah does and his "grown up" mom didn't.


When we got to "Y" for the yellow brick road, Judah knew quickly that the answer to, "Who is this?," was "Dorty." It was great being able to have this time with him,but my favorite part of the lesson is when we get to go down in to the studio and let the kids create their own masterpieces.

Appropriately, today they made sunflowers. After the gluing and placement was complete, the instructions were to make fingerprints out of black and brown paint. This was to create the effect of sunflowers. Judah is such an individual, and a budding impressionist. He took his own interpretation of seeds and had a messy blast!

I wish I was more like him at times! He's not afraid to do his own thing!

Love to all!

3 comments:

  1. Anonymous10:46 AM CDT

    this is confusing

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  2. Anonymous11:37 AM CDT

    Actually I did know about Langston Hughes, but that's cuz it's a big deal since he lived in/near Lawrence. The elem. school near my parents' house is named for him.
    Lacy - I signed up for a digital photography class this summer at City Arts. I won't be any where near as good as you though. But I'm still resisting my own blog.
    Jennifer M.

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  3. Nicely done, Judah. Looks like a fun time. Actually you've inspired Jennette to see if there's anythin like that here in COS.

    ReplyDelete