activities with your kids

Category Archives: art museums in NYC

January Wishes and Colorful Wonders

January is always thrilling and exciting as we cast our sites on new things ahead! Here’s a few art projects to keep your kids dreaming, wishing and motivated to continue new art projects through the end of January!

Wishing Wand
Supplies: Cardstock Contact paper, Scissors, Assorted Sequins and Glitter, Lours, Marker, Stick/Dowel, Pencil, Ribbon or Wired Garland


Cut out two stars with Cardstock Paper, then take the contact paper and cut it out two times. Make them the size of the star. ****Leave enough room so that the contact paper can be glued to the star later. Decorate one of the contact paper with assorted sequins and glitter lours. Then glue the edges of the contact paper together. Finally, glue the contact paper to the edges of the star. If you have any edges of the contact paper that extends outside of the star then just cut around and re-glue the edges. Last but not least, Set Goals and Resolutions: Write around the outside of the star goals and things to look forward to. 
For example:“FRONT: In 2021, I want to create, earn a new belt, go to the beach. BACK: Learn to read, illustrate, start eating dessert after breakfast.”
-New Years Centerpiece and Wishing Wand, Dancers4Life

Alcohol Ink Coasters  

  • 4 tile coasters (the non-porous and shiny kind 🙂  
  • Ranger Alcohol Inks ( several colors of choice)  
  • Rubbing Alcohol  
  • Felt  
  • Black Paint  
  • Mod Podge Glue ( or glue of choice)  
  • Paint brushes  
  • Wax paper or something to protect you work surface ( these inks stain…trust me – I learned the hard way !)   
  • Spray Sealer 

First, lay down wax paper on the table, then place the coasters on top. The wax paper will protect the table from spilled paint staining the table. Second, use a paint brush to rub the alcohol on the coasters. Third, place the colors in order of what you want to use first. Then start dropping the paint on the coasters. If you have any white spots then just add more color to it. Fourth, paint the sides black or any color of your choosing. Fifth, cut squares out of black felt. Leave it until you coat the bottom of the coaster with mod podge or glue. Then you can stick the felt to the bottom. Finally, use the spray seal over the paint side and allow it to dry overnight. Enjoy your finished colorful art project!  

-PC and Project: Instructables Living 

Fun Facts about Alcohol Ink!

“Alcohol inks are an exciting new medium in the art world that allow a free flow of expression with a variety of techniques. Artists who specialize in alcohol inks have developed styles that range, from representational art that captures the natural world, to abstract art specializing in serene and gilded designs.“

“The powerful punches of color, use of non-absorbent surfaces, and ability to maintain a clean seal with resin have allowed alcohol ink art to captivate a wide range of art enthusiasts. This artwork is a beautiful way to decorate your walls, as well as all manner of household objects. Alcohol ink artists are famous for their versatility in substrates, as they paint glass vases, jewelry and metals, and functional wooden pieces. No matter what substrate they drop their ink onto, the pieces always come out looking stunning.”

“Louise Christian uses alcohol inks to paint natural scenes, such as forests, trees, flowers, and mushrooms. Her painting range from impressionistic to realistic. Her techniques make use of bold, bright colors and unique textures. To create her full desired vision, she mixes the media by drawing over her paintings with ink pens.”

-PC and Article: Artists Who are Famous for Using Alcohol Ink, Smart Art Box, 2019

Contact us about our art classes to keep your kids busy throughout the year!

Art + Electronics=Fun

Dear Parents, 

With CCA, screen time in 2021 may surprise you! Videos which encourages Imagination and exercise + Quality Art Materials, for your ‘At-Home’ Art Studio!  Weekly live engagement classes (optional) will keep your kids active and inspired to work each week…OFFLINE!   

Meeting and drawing our favorite penguin, Sweet Scarlett and the animals she encounters, travelling the world. Building icy coves & igloos in the South Pole  Even make-your-own snow STEM activities! Kids draw each animal family, various scenes, landscapes, igloos and lots, lots more! Each week is filled with new ideas to start them off running and creating, even after class- all week long. They’ll love using their hands, brains and bodies in Story Adventures: An interactive 3-D Art Adventure kids watch, learn to create & build themselves while reading and hearing stories of friendship adventures across many countries and cultures. 

This class takes off February 1, 2021. Virtual Live & In-Person classes begin February 4 @ All Souls Church, 1157 Lexington Avenue on the UES of NYC!

Register ASAP: Click Here to receive your Art Kit in time for virtual classes!

 Try the 1st week and recieve your Wk. 1 Art Kit, including all art tools below!

Story Adventures Programming

What is it? A Social Emotional Learning program based in visual arts,cultural exploration, literature and dance!


What will my child be doing? Diving into a new story adventure every month. Creating the characters and sets in the story through visual art classes. Moving their body and developing a love of movement and coordination through dance technique videos. Building confidence through art, theater and musical games. 


What will I gain? Art heals and unites. The Story Adventures program builds the language of resilience, empowers kids with character, gains conflict resolution problem-solving skills along with a love for literature, art skills, fantasy and travel!


How do I access the program? Create a schedule that works best for your family’s needs. Live zoom classes are available once a week for students to create it together!  All pre-recorded drawing videos are available through Google classroom, accessible anytime. Exercise is also included through story-related movement and dance videos!


Watch your child’s eyes light up as they receive exciting CCA Art Kits,filled with art studio materials that will last for years. Hearts will soar as your child creates amazing art projects. Share joy in your entire household when you have an alternative to screen time. If you need to make a call or get work done, put on a Story Adventures video to keep your child moving and creating!

Sign up and Register Now!

“She seriously loves it all… the art and the dancing! This is a great program. She is dancing all over the house.” Theresa’s mom Alison“Lilah’s “favorites” are; getting the boxes delivered, unpacking all the art supplies, Using watercolor pencils, I really know how to draw penguins and whales now and all the characters in the book.” –Lilah’s mom Brina 

Favorite 2020 Kid’s Activities & Highlights? We did it… Together.

The past year has been challenging but we have been able to grow in so many new ways.  Congratulate yourself for making it through this year! We couldn’t have made it without you, extraordinary parents! 

Thank you for continuing to enrich our community with your remarkable dedication to CCA’s mission and values. A year-in-review of some of our favorite moments helps us to focus on the positive, during this up & down rollercoaster of a year! Enjoy!

Making a Jeff Koons with plasterwrap and balloons

Favorite 2020 Kid’s Activities & Highlights @ Claire’s Creative Adventures?  

–Toured the Metropolitan Museum of Art with all classes (2.5-10’s) to see the amazing exhibit Making Marvels, the Science and Splendor at the Courts of Europe and making clocks (pre-Covid19) 

-In March, smoothly transferred all programs online without missing a class, keeping sane with empowerment and humor… starting with creating the virus as a Pac-Man & a Crunch Berry! “Crunchatize me Captain!” 

-Age-appropriated ART KITS grew to include all of the unique materials we would have used at school, shipped to each new home… including STEAM projects, like how to make your own Lava Lamps and snow!

–Jonathan Lev was a visiting artist to our Art Adventures STUDIO Online Class where students 8-15 years learned how to draw landsccapes, architecture, perspecitve and portraits, including virtual studio tours of contemporary artists!

-Partnered with Central Studios (STL) to bring to life Penguins, Polar Bears, and Mermaids with 2D drawings, 3D set constructions, movement and dance for summer’s debut of DanceArt Camp (via Zoom) with fully-packed, weekly art kits

–Built our famous snow globes  

–Explored Chinese Art using new art materials: Bamboo brushes, ink and rice paper

-Celebrated Holi week and created our own colored paints 

 -Dove into color mixing with transclucent vellum and Elmer the Elephant in Mini-Art Adventures

-Created a stain glass mosaic for Mother’s Day 

–Made our very own 2D-3D FROZEN translucent collage posters in Art Adventure Class

-Made haunted houses, painted foam skulls and bones, and created spooky necklaces in our FREE Halloween Kids Art Event! (in collaboration with Blue Bus Project held at the Culture Lab in Long Island City)

-Designed and Celebrated a 5 and 3 year old unicorn and construction birthday party during Covid-19

-Toured the newly-opened Metropolitan Museum of Art this fall with families:  2 boys, ages 8 & 11 with their grandparents, metal embossing + projects exploring Impressionism and color theory!

Be ready 2021, we are coming for you with new joy and inspiration in our hearts!  

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!

Despite the pandemic, we are very THANKFUL for the family or friends that we are able to connect with either in their homes or by a phone call. We also want to take a moment to be thankful for the things that we do have this fall season: A warm bed to sleep in, a warm meal on the table and art supplies in our cabinets or strewn across the table! 

What do Matisse, Eric Carle, Claes Oldenburg and Wayne Thiebaud have in common?

Answer: Food Art! 

An Art Adventures blast from the past for Turkeyday fun: PLAY WITH YOUR FOOD! Create food art, inspired by Thiebaud and Matisse and remembering Oldenburg from MoMA’s 2013 exhibition. (We LOVED placing our works on the Thanksgiving table to try to fool the family!)

“Matisse lived during France’s Belle Époque. Café culture was at its height, and cafés were where artists came together to exchange stories, discuss new artistic styles, and eat good food*. What a way to live, discuss and create together! We can do the same today, by making pastries and creating food art out of play dough or cutting newspaper, magazines and colorful plastic bags. Eric Carle and Matisse liked to make their own painted patterned papers (or markers)… THEN cut them up to collage onto cardboard with a glue stick! Make patterns or paint from cool colors: greens, blues and purples, because Green Beans are so fun to cut! (and eat.)

Check out our dinner table collages and dessert sculptures from our Art Adventure Classes:

MoMA’s exhibition of Claes Oldenburg: The Street and The Store was displayed in August of 2013. This was one of our favorite tours to lead! Oldenburg is known for his depictions of everyday objects, here as sculptures.  The Street is comprised of objects made from cardboard, burlap and newspaper (Playdough/Model Magic) and The Store is made up of brightly painted sculptures and reliefs.

How would you build your own food sculpture? Will your turkey be blue or purple? What would you use?

Let’s see your pics! @clairescreative or FB: #clairescreativeadventures

In past Party Adventures, Claes Oldenburg has inspired bushels of fun!

We wish you a very happy & creative Thanksgiving! Enjoy your holiday:)


*Gomez-Rejon, M. (2014, Update 2017) Cooking Art History: Dining with Matisse. Website retrieved from https://www.huffpost.com/entry/cooking-art-history-dinin_b_5339438

Quarantine Shmorenteen

The pandemic has provided for more “home time” than ever before… which has lended new emerging artists (+ kids!) to “think outside of the box” as they have been “inside a box” (house) for way too long. See below to use household items in drawings & papier-mâché:)

An example is the “Ode to Helen Rosner’s Roast Chicken” by Agnes Barton, 39 from Corvallis, Oregon. She has been crafting with the things around her house during the pandemic. Barton-Sabo used “flour, water, masking tape, two issues of the New Yorker and acrylic paint” to share the joys of Helen Rosner’s viral video of “drying chicken skin with a hair dryer.” She wants her artwork during this time to evoke emotions of laughter by her ridiculous imagery (Cavna, 2020).

Another young man, Kristián Mensa in 2016 (before the pandemic), also reimagined “every day objects” to talented pieces of artwork! “To create these whimsical compositions, Mensa pairs…items with minimalist drawings that incorporate the 3D elements among bold lines.” He takes half of an orange (peeled) to use for the back of a turtle or a row of paintbrushes and draws a man mowing over them (Barnes, 2016).

Thankfully, we have outlandish artwork like these due to the work of the impressionists in the 19th century who wanted to go against the “rigid and carefully finished images of the Académies des Beaux-Arts (historical subjects, realistic themes and portraits)” and instead pushed for color, emotion, personality, and imagination in landscape and still life. It also opened the way, for a new modern medium, photography– which at first impressionists thought it “devalued their art skill” until they curved their perception and “sought to express nature and modern city life” in their own pieces (Lumen Learning, N/A) 

Here is a painting from Dina D’ Argo, 56, from Springfield, Tennessee, whom used acrylic paints to paint “In the Void.” The painting shares the emotion of “stepping into the unknown.” As humans, we can’t see what is up ahead and so we move with uncertainty into the future. “The veil symbolizes not only the unwillingness to accept reality, but also our cultural preoccupation with covering or uncovering one’s face, and what it represents or says about who we are as a society…” The floating finally reminds the viewer that we must accept the chaos and go with the flow of life (Cavna, 2020). 

How creative have your kids been during quarantine? Share with us! Email your images of artwork: claire@clairescreativeadventures.com with the subject line reading, “Quarentine Artwork” or tag your artwork on your social media accounts: Instagram: @clairescreative OR Facebook: @clairescreativeadventures and send us a quick instant message saying that you sent your artwork.

Works Cited

Barnes, Sara (2016). Teenage Artist Playfully Adds Everyday Objects to Complete Clever Illustrations. Website retrieved from https://mymodernmet.com/kristian-mensa-real-object-illustrations/?fbclid=IwAR1efUkHEHqKjhQb40u4MV81atm4KcyaZCArfqOJsDbTxX_A_CZsYy4cGPw

Cavna, Michael (2020). The best art created by Washington Post readers during the Pandemic. Website retrieved from https://www.washingtonpost.com/arts-entertainment/2020/07/06/art-pandemic-readers/?arc404=true

Lumen Learning (Unknown). Impressionism. Website retrieved from 

Impressionism

Blast from the Past:

CCA ‘s repeat attendance enabled us to search for brand new art to teach each year. In January 2011, we explored exciting ways that regular old paper can be transformed into fantastic art. We studied a variety of artists and their techniques including: Mia Pearlman, Andrea Dezsö and Betrice Coron. Here you see the first stage of our cut paper mobiles project inspired by Mia Pearlman. Students each made at least two drawings with one featuring curvy shapes and one with angle shapes. The next step was to cut out some of the shapes created. Choosing which shapes to cut out, which to leave and just how much negative space to keep around the shapes were important decisions each student had to make about their artwork.The next phase included assembling the pieces into a paper mobile. Here are some end results!

A special Thank you to all our parents out there!

With all of the current news, we know how overwhelming it must be for parents. Life has brought many challenging twists and turns.

SO from all of us, we want to say

THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU 🙏 for being AMAZING!

We ❤️ you for ALL that you do.

Let’s continue to work together to bring heART 💜 💙 💛 ❤️ 💚 into your homes and extra creative sunshine ☀️  with Spring 🌸 Art Adventures Live Online

♥️ Claire’s Creative Adventures

2020 Class Inspiration

We know there are a lot of activities for your children and are excited to make Art Adventures, an early enrichment league, on the top of their list.

 

What do we have in store? Learning from the masters, Multi-cultural art and Contemporary Artists. Children will learn how to paint, draw, sculpt, mosaic, work with plastics, wood, metal and wire.

 

As well as ART IN THE PARK this spring and a little French along the way!

Each class will take a trip to the Metropolitan Museum of Art per semester for a Museum Adventure.

 

New to Art Adventures? CCA (Claire’s Creative Adventures) programs have a 3:1 or even 2:1 student-teacher ratio, myriad material exploration, optional French, as well as lunch & art + after-school programs since 2001 @ All Souls Church.

Join us! Register Today. Proration available.

 

Staying in the City for Spring Break? We’re having a Spring Break Art Adventure Camp!

Having a stay-cation this spring? GREAT NEWS! Spring Break Art Camps are BACK!

Magnet Metallic Sculpture (Ages 7+)

Daily Painting as inspired by a contemporary or modern Artist (Ages 4+)

Bonsai Cherry Blossom Tree Wire Sculptures (Ages 5+)

 

JOIN US during your spring break in March for our art enrichment camp

 

Geometric Glass Mandala Art Terrarium (Ages 5-7)

DETAILS:

WHEN:
Camp Session 1: March 16th- March 20th
Camp Session 2: March 23rd – March 27th
Time: 930am – 1230pm
Where: All Soul’s Church
Ages: 5 – 10

CLICK HERE to Save your spot!!