Farewell, Summer Camp and Hello Fall Classes!

Another summer has come and gone at The Art Center. Our adult classes return this week, and we even have a brief moment of False Fall weather to truly put an endcap on the summer chapter.

Camp is, of course, the primary focus of our summer here at The Art Center. With over 60 camps offered and more than 650 students registered during the 9 weeks of our camps, we stayed very lively! Our campers ranged in age from rising Kindergartners to rising Seniors and spent their weeks diving deep into lessons in drawing, painting, ceramics, creative writing, fashion, theatre, and more. Camp is such a fun opportunity to give our older students the chance to really focus on improving their art for a week and to give our younger students the chance to explore a lot of different mediums and learn what they truly love to do. They made some gorgeous art projects, formed new friendships, and brought a surprising quantity of roly-polies into the building over the course of the nine weeks.

The art was a lot cuter than the armies of roly polies.

Another aspect of camp we enjoy is seeing old friends return to us. Several of our teachers were once students at our camps and after-school classes, coming back to us in the summer on break from their college courses to teach. It is one of our favorite things about working at The Art Center, this opportunity to watch our students grow with us from their youth and then find employment with us or in other arts institutions.

"Pufferfish Tea Set" by Brooke Denny from the High Honors Exhibition

This summer also featured a full Teen Takeover. We had the High Honors exhibit on display through June and early July, which showcased the incredible talent of middle and high school students from the Johns Creek and surrounding regions. The range of imaginative concepts and the breadth of skill achieved by these students made for a fascinating and beautiful exhibition that we were honored to have on display. Keep an eye out for next year’s High Honors; it gets better every year and it’s one you don’t want to miss!

Teen Takeover continued with the clever antics of our summer intern, Vanessa, who commandeered our social media for the summer and brought delightful fresh energy to Facebook and Instagram. She teamed up with our other teen volunteers and assistants to keep communications fun and interesting all summer, and we are overwhelmingly grateful for her hard work, her friendly and professional demeanor, and her endless curiosity and drive to learn.

The end of summer camp is always a little bittersweet. We are sad to say goodbye to our campers and our seasonal staff, but we look forward to saying hello to all of our adult students and instructors we don’t get to see over the break. We look forward to seeing some of our younger campers return when Youth Fall I begins again after Labor Day, and we have many more fun and exciting events to look forward to in the coming months! For now, we celebrate the end of summer with the annual Summer Serendipity juried art exhibition, on display until the closing reception on September 6^th.