The Attleboro Museum, Center for the Arts employs a multi-disciplinary approach to arts education through the Museum School and exhibition-related programs and outreach. The Museum School curriculum offers a wide variety of stimulating and challenging studio courses for students of all ages and levels of experience. Courses in basic drawing and painting; clay-wheel throwing and sculpture-portraits and more; and crafts are offered in four eight-week sessions throughout the year. In addition the Museum School offers 4-day art camps for children in different age groups throughout the summer. Students have the opportunity to learn about visual art concepts and techniques, and to develop their individual creative abilities in a supportive learning environment.
Last year the school enrolled 289 adults (41 classes and workshops) and 263 children (29 classes, workshops and vacation camps) from 20 different communities. The faculty are professional artists and art educators, some of whom have been approved to conduct classes for credit by the Massachusetts College of Art.
Youth programs emphasize small classes, age-appropriate curriculum, individualized instruction and the opportunity to explore creative expression. Talented, motivated teens are encouraged to enroll in adult classes. Additionally, the Museum offers and intensive 8 day, 32 hours portfolio preparation class for Art College applicants.
Adult courses are designed to be responsive to a diverse range of individual backgrounds, knowledge and talents. Intensive workshops that focus on specific techniques, aesthetic issues or other creative endeavors, are designed to respond to student’s interests and needs. For example, in the spring Clare Walker Leslie offered a one-day workshop entitled “Learning to Observe and Connect with the World Around You” and Anne Heywood taught a two-day “Beginners Pastel Painting” class. On May 9, 2001 the Museum presented Robert Douglas Hunter in a demonstration entitled “The Impressionist Point of View.” In June Diane Scott gave a two-day “Plein Air Landscape Painting Workshop. Many local school teachers enroll in these workshops or other Museum courses that are approved by The Massachusetts Department of Education for professional development points.
The Museum’s educational mission reaches beyond the Museum walls with exhibition related programming and community outreach. In March the Museum hosted Anne Heywood who presented “Women Artists: Their Images” in conjunction with Women’s History month. The Museum was the site of an Illustration Forum which included the artists in the “Fine Art of the Illustrator” exhibition held from March 18 – April 22, 2001. In conjunction with the Pastel Painter’s Society Signature 2001 exhibition held at the Museum also during March and April, 2001, Rosalie Nadeau gave a pastel painting demonstration in the Museum’s main gallery.
In August the Museum, in conjunction with the Attleboro Teen Center, will conduct a “Digital Photography/Documentary Project.” Children taking part will learn communications technology applications to the visual arts and digital skills which are beyond the cope of typical after school offerings. The work will be collaborative and that means that the children will work together to write and produce a documentary project about their community, their families and themselves. The project will expand and enrich participants views of themselves and their community. Funds for this project were provided by the Attleboro Cultural Council