Camp Kala Calendar- For Reference Only
2022 Camp Calendar
Week 1: June 6-10 / Fun Fabric Art Creations / Ages: 6-11
Description: Let’s look at animals, nature, and people as inspiration for colorful works on fabric! Explore color, shape, pattern, and texture to create fun projects such as your own soft sculpture, batik fabric, and a patterned wall hanging or tote bag. We’ll practice drawing from life and images, and learn about textiles and simple artmaking techniques using paint, ink, glue, fabric markers, and more. Create unique works of art, including your own functional wearable art, and start the summer expressing yourself unlimitedly!
Week 2: June 13 – 17 / The Comics Lab: Adventures in Visual Storytelling / Ages: 6-11
Description: Join us for a week full of comics, characters, and visual storytelling! Using mixed media, such as crayons, pens, ink with a brush, and even watercolor, participants will create characters and take them on adventures to unknown places in the wildlands of their imagination. We will play with sound effects, expressions, movement, and backgrounds. How many panels does it take to tell a joke? How many for a love story? How does a camera angle affect the drama? We will take inspiration from some of the characters and creators of our favorite comics to create our own stories.
Week 3: June 20 – 24 / Paper Puppet Paradise / Ages: 6-11
Description: Bring your stories to life through puppetry! Puppetry allows us to be builders, writers, designers, performers, and illustrators all at once. In this week of collaborative exploration, we’ll be storytelling and creating illustrations to bring to life. Using recycled materials, mixed media, paper, and a variety of drawing and painting tools, participants will create a new, never before seen story! Together, we will experiment with materials, building techniques, design choices, and story-making. Let’s build paper puppets, scenery, and a short show that we can film!
Week 3: June 20 – 24 / Silkscreen: Protest Anything! / Ages: 11-17
Description: In this experimental workshop, we will explore the DIY world of multiples through silkscreen. Participants learn the basics of silkscreen through two print projects, focusing on functional possibilities in print. Youth will develop and print a one-color logo project (branding) where participants can bring in their own items to print. The class culminates in a multiple-color protest poster, where participants use print to express their point of view and participate in a print exchange with other youth artists.
Week 4: June 27 – July 1 / Drawing From Life: Expression through Seeing / Ages: 11-17
Description: Practice different drawing techniques in a fun, studio environment. We will explore the way that drawing can reflect our individual perspective, through careful observation and exploration of mark-making. Learn about line quality, form, tone, negative space, and composition while drawing from observation and reference using a variety of drawing media. Projects will include linear perspective study, still life, portraits, the figure (with a live model), landscapes, and personal narrative. We will look at local and contemporary artists and consider how representation can also be a means of expression. Join this class and explore your drawing voice!
Week 5: July 5 – July 8 / Collaborative Creativity: Art-in-Motion / Ages: 6-11
Description: Working across various media such as painting, drawing, sculpture, and installation, young artists will create a collaborative installation with kinetic elements. Throughout the week, we will explore abstract and representational forms and themes inspired by the natural environment, soundscapes, and our bodies. Paying close attention to the act of creating and associated physical movement, we will incorporate moving parts and pieces in our creations. From mobiles to self-portraits, we will experiment with diverse art materials such as recyclable materials, repurposed objects, paint, paper, fabric, wire, and teamwork! Let’s imagine the possibilities of making art in motion!
Week 6: July 11 – July 15 / Oodles of Doodles: Cartooning, Comics, and Zines / Ages: 11-17
Description: Experiment with storytelling and cartooning through comics! We will learn the process of creating our own comics from start to finish with original characters and narratives. The class will progress through ideation, storyboarding, sketching, inking, lettering, and coloring. Participants will learn how to access their personal drawing style through fun cartooning activities and tell stories using visual narratives pioneered by artists like Lynda Barry and Ivan Brunetti.
Week 7: July 18 – July 22 / Sculptural Play / Ages: 6-11
Description: Explore concepts and techniques of a sculptural practice using cardboard, papier-mâché , clay, nature, and more! During the week, young artists will play with scale, line shape, texture, and color to create sculptures from observation and the imagination inspired by people, animals, and nature. As a class, we will also work collaboratively on a life-size painted cardboard sculpture. From the real to the fantastical, discover the endless fun of sculpture!
Week 7: July 18 – July 22 / Urban Photography: The Camera & Landscape / Ages: 11-17
Description: Learn about the variety of styles of photography that encompass the camera and the landscape it photographs. Photography genres such as street photography, architecture photography, environmental photography, documentary, and photojournalism will be introduced, as we discuss artists and activists who use the camera as their unique creative tool. Throughout the week, youth will engage in outdoor “Inspo Walks” for inspiration as we observe and capture the local landscape through the camera lens. Youth artists will be encouraged to explore their creativity and experiment with styles as they learn the technical and conceptual aspects of photography including framing and composition. At the Digital Arts Lab at Kala, participants will be introduced to photo editing applications as we discuss and learn how to review and manipulate digital images for various purposes.
Week 8: July 25 – July 29 / Acrylic Painting: Endless Possibilities / Ages: 11-17
Description: This summer, we will dedicate a whole week to getting intimately familiar with acrylic paint and exploring the many different ways it can be used. We will look at some great master painters as well as diverse contemporary artists as references. Importantly, we will consider composition, color theory, subject matter, and different textures and layers one can achieve with acrylic, from translucent watercolor-like layers, to flat graphic color, and to thick impasto-like textures. We will practice painting from observation (including plein air), reference images and items of choice, and a live model to create several artworks by the end of the class. Do you mix your paint on the palette or the canvas? For that matter, do you paint on canvas, board, or paper? What’s the right brush for which task? End your summer with a deeper knowledge of acrylic painting techniques and concepts.
2021 Camp Calendar
In Person Camps:
Week 1: June 7-11 / Globe Trotters: An Artmaking Journey Around the World / Ages: 5-11
Description: Take a trip around the world this summer! Create projects inspired by the vibrant arts and cultures across the globe. Participants will explore traditional art-making techniques such as ceramics, weaving, and printmaking. Expand your knowledge and have fun through hands-on projects with clay, textiles, paint, and more!
Week 2: June 14 – 18./ Finding Your Voice: Comics & Storytelling / Ages: 5-11
Description: Draw your own story! Campers will dive in to developing their own voice as an artist and get comfortable using a sketchbook as a tool to support that voice. Using mixed media, such as crayons, pens, and found objects, students will develop a sketchbook that is packed with personality and stands on its own as a work of art.
Week 3: June 21 – 25 / Mixed Media Summer Madness! / Ages: 5-11
Description: Explore color, shape, pattern, and texture using mixed media such as paint, collage, graphite, and sculpture to actively investigate the world around you! Create mixed media work inspired by artists throughout history, including contemporary artists. Have fun creating abstract and representational objects, places, human and animal forms, and experiment with diverse materials to express your ideas unlimitedly!
Week 3: June 21 – 25 / Street Photography: Snapshots of Our Community / Ages: 11-17
Description: Explore your community and city through the art of street photography. Street photography is the practice of capturing the people and spaces around you in a spontaneous and exciting way. Expand your ideas about framing, composition, and making everyday moments beautiful, all while walking around the neighborhood!
Week 4: June 28 – July 2 / Teen Studio Workshop: Drawing and Painting from Life / Ages: 11-17
Description: Practice different drawing and painting techniques in a fun, studio environment. Learn about line quality, form, color, negative space and composition while drawing from observation and reference. Students will have a chance to improve technical and representational skills through a variety of subjects such as still life, a live model, natural and urban landscape and each other. We will look at local and contemporary artists and consider how representation can also be a means of expression.
Week 5: July 6 – July 9 / Tuning In: The Kala Youth Podcast Project / Ages: 11-17
Description: Join the youth podcast crew! In this class, engage with the world around you by tuning into the sound/s in the surrounding environment.
Gain experience conceptualizing, narrating, and structuring a podcast. Learn how to operate a sound recorder, and experiment with best practices for recording sounds professionally. You will learn about and record different kinds of sounds: ambience, sound events, voiceover, and interviews. Choose one or a few recordings to create into a final podcast to share by the end of the week.
Week 5: July 6 – July 9 / Roadmap to Graphic Novels: A Comic Workshop / Ages: 11-17
Description: Turn your drawings into an adventure! Campers will be introduced to the process of creating a graphic novel from the ground up. As a class we’ll use our favorite stories and characters to inspire worlds of our own, write a script, and bring those stories to life as finished comic pages. Students will learn how to utilize techniques like composition, pacing, and ‘sound’ effects to equip them with everything they need to make comics of any length at home, regardless of technical skill/experience.
Week 6: July 12 – July 16 / Wild, Wild Life: Exploring the Animal Planet! / Ages: 5-11
Description: Join in on the fun as we explore animals and their habitats across the planet! Take a closer look at natural environments from under the sea to tropical rainforests, and meet the animals that live there. Students will use eco-friendly art materials such as recyclable materials, repurposed objects, and natural resources.
Week 7: July 19 – July 23 / Beyond Ink + Paper: Experimental Screenprinting / Ages: 11-17
Description: In this workshop, participants will learn and practice the fundamentals of screenprinting. After getting some experience with one-color and multiple color printing on paper, you will get an opportunity to use alternative mediums and techniques on surfaces other than paper to create a unique, experimental project that can be wearable, shareable, collaborative, or exist as its own installation piece. What if we made our own “ink” with fruit juices? Can you print on plastic or glass? How can we push the boundaries of traditional printmaking? Bring your ideas to the studio, and let’s find out!
Week 8: July 26 – July 30 / Creative Painting & Sculpture: Shaping Our World / Ages: 5-11
Description: Explore concepts and techniques of painting and sculpture working with clay, plaster, and more. Play with scale, line, shapes, textures, and color to create painted sculptures from observation and the imagination inspired by people, animals, and nature. From the real to the fantastical, discover the endless fun of sculpture and watch them come to life!
Camp Kala On- Line Camps:
Week 4: June 28 – July 2 / Mixed Media Summer Madness / Ages: 5-11
Description: Explore color, shape, pattern, and texture using mixed media such as paint, collage, graphite, and sculpture to actively investigate the world around you! Create mixed media work inspired by artists throughout history, including contemporary artists. Have fun creating abstract and representational objects, places, human and animal forms, and experiment with diverse materials to express your ideas unlimitedly!