Wednesday, April 14, 2010

WPCA to feature artist members for Gallery Night and beyond!

WPCA has always enjoyed an extraordinary support of the local community. Our artist members and volunteers have been the life and blood of our organization and recently, have had ample opportunities to prove their loyalty.


Jean Sobon, Gravitation, collage, 10" x 13"

For the past three months we have been working extremely hard moving the Center, cleaning up the old space (imagine what a job it was after 17 busy years) and renovating the building at 839 South 5th Street. Working with a shoestring budget we created two galleries, changed configuration of the walls, laid down and finished new floors, painted the entire space and are about to install spiffy track lighting. These are just the big projects – it is hard to account for all the mundane and detailed tasks that have also been completed. We would have never been able to accomplish all this without the help and contribution of our artist-friends. They dedicated a lot of their time and talent and we will never be able to fully pay back our debt. Over 70 people spent uncountable hours cleaning, hauling garbage and ripping out old tile. It’s been a truly extraordinary effort. We are thankful to them all!


Richard Knight, Studio Heap, mixed media on paper, 36" x 48"

With our sparkling new facility, we can showcase the work of our members on a regular basis and we are looking forward to curating them into a variety of exhibitions. On the Spring Gallery Night, April 16th, we will start by featuring the work of our special friends who have been essential in our recent endeavors.

We are proud to display works by:


Keith Nelson, untitled, encaustic on panel

Monday, April 12, 2010

Vibrant Afternoons with Art!



While the downstairs spaces have been buzzing with electric sanders, squeaking with paint rollers and smelling of polyurethene and latex, our gorgeous classroom spaces welcomed the sunny spring with the first installment of AFTERNOONS WITH ART.

Nearly 30 young people descended on WPCA to explore color and its expressive impact through visual art and movement exercises. We are sharing here some records of their joyful presence in our space. Look for more soon, as our friend, member and amazing volunteer, Jose Alfredo Chavez is currently assembling a video documentation of this fun project.













If you know any young people, keep your eye for our Drop-in after School sessions that will be resuming very shortly! And, remember that the Summer Art Camp starts June 22 - it is not too early to save your spot, for just one week, or all seven of them.
More fun times to come!

Saturday, April 10, 2010

WPCA's busy art education programs!


This fun mandala that is going to be on display at Barnes and Noble bookstore at Mayfair Mall for the month of April as a part of MPS Afterschool Programs Art Show. It was created by the talented Kagel Elementary students at the Latino Community Center.

This project was produced as a part of Dare to Dream curriculum developed in partnership between Walker’s Point Center for the Arts and Arts@Large to provide quality art programming to Milwaukee’s youth. This program combines art and movement. Students learn a choreographed piece from Puerto Rico named bomba. Students also study the meaning of mandalas, cultural and historical contexts and how mandalas can be used as tools to visualize and achieve their dreams and aspirations.

The beginning of the piece is a photograph of the students in bomba formation taken from above. Then the photograph is enlarged and transferred to canvas so that students can paint and embellish it.

Students are taught elements and principles of art and dance for deeper understanding and meaningful art making process.

Dance Vocabulary: movement, space, time, level, direction, beat, duration...
Art Vocabulary: line, shape, symmetry, color, repetition, rhythm, balance...

The artist instructors for this project were Kate Bradley and Miriam Levie.