Kids Can Stretch Their Art Muscles in Spring Break Workshops

Kayla Desroches/KMXT

The Kodiak Arts Council will hold an arts camp over spring break next week during which it’ll provide workshops for children in everything from multimedia craft to music.

So, the video game extraordinaire in your family could learn to strum the ukulele. Or they could apply their fine-tuned motor skills to drawing. Other classes include improvisation, storytelling, and hand lettering, which is a class that the Kodiak Arts Council’s Arts Education Coordinator, Brianna Gibbs, will lead.   

Gibbs describes it as a course in modern calligraphy.

“It’s not necessarily the very rigid, used with a traditional calligraphy pen style of writing, but a little more fanciful cursive if that’s even a word. I’m learning how to do block letters, bold print, maybe 3D lettering. So, that’s why I call it hand lettering and not necessarily calligraphy.”

Gibbs says she’s always loved letters and the written word, and that’s where the hobby began.

“And just sort of through my own doodlings have kind of crafted it into something that other people have said they like, so I was able to teach a class through the Arts Council this fall for adults, and that was super successful, and we had some youth in that class, so we thought why not open up a spring arts to it?”

She says students will go through a workbook that she’s created, which will guide them in her approach to hand lettering.

“Tips and tricks, how they can turn their letters into something a little more creative. And so, that’ll be day one is kinda getting the basics, and then on day two, we’ll actually take those skills, and I’ll have some kinda watercolor wash paper or notecards that they can then use their handwriting skills to create either a quote board or a card or anything.”

She says workshops begin Monday and each day starts with a drawing lesson.

“Those classes are led by local artist Rick Chamberlain, who is a fabulous artist. He’ll be working primarily with cartooning and helping students actually turn knock knock jokes into three part cartoons. I’ve seen some of his work and his examples for what he hopes to do with the students, and they’re fabulous.”

Students can take however many classes they’d like. You can find a complete list of the workshops online at the Kodiak Arts Council website.