Fall Into Art!

We’ve been busy at Youth in Arts getting Fall programs up and running at schools across the region and here on C Street!
Mentor Artist Cathy Bowman, for example, is teaching visual arts at both Lagunitas in San Geronimo and at Bayside-MLK Academy in Marin City. At Lagunitas, it was challenging to engage middle school teen boys in the visual arts process. But when Cathy encouraged them to carve their own linoleum blocks for prints, entrusting them with sharp tools and teaching them about the importance of caution and control in creating a good design, they rose to the occasion creating beautiful work! You’ll be able to see for yourself this January-February when Lagunitas student work is featured in our YIA Gallery!

Mentor Artist Shawna Alapai’i has also started teaching ukelele and hula at Cascade Canyon in Fairfax. Shawna combines music and dance techniques with stories from the native Hawai’ian tradition that link to nature and the Earth.
She will be bringing her own performance ensemble, Halau Hula Na Pua O Ka La’akea to Cascade Canyon for the children to experience, and then students will work up to their own December performance!
YIA Visual Arts specialist Suzanne Joyal is about to start our fourth year of the Walker Rezaian Creative HeArts Kindergarten Arts program. This amazing program engages kindergarteners and their teachers and families in a comprehensive visual arts learning program grounded in a theme of friendship, honoring 5-year-old Walker Rezaian’s life and love of art. This year–thanks in particular to donors at our April 2016 “Travel the World” gala–we will be expanding the program to a second site at Venetia Valley this year. Find out more about this special program in the video here.

Out-of-school, in our Intensive Arts Mentorship (I AM) programs, teens have been busy working on visual and performing arts skills and projects. C Street Project students created a giant-sized “Walkable Comic” for “Litquake” San Rafael, on exhibit in our YIA Gallery through mid-November. Click here for details on when to visit or how to arrange a free gallery visit for your school or youth group.
`Til Dawn A Cappella spent a Fall retreat weekend together and this week will open the Youth Leadership section of the National Bioneers Conference on Friday at the Marin Center in San Rafael. We are also taking `Til Dawn and C Street Project students to the Visual and Performing Arts college fair in South San Francisco this Sunday as part of our new “I AM Success” program to help teen artists pursue life beyond high school in the arts.
`Til Dawn is also busy rehearsing for their November 12 performance at “Signed-Sealed-Delivered, A Cappella Live!” at Dominican University. And save the date–Monday, December 26–for the `Til Dawn SING OUT! at Sweetwater Music Hall in Mill Valley!
We have also been busy booking assembly performances for school and community sites. For example, Dance Palace Community Center is presenting a series of Youth in Arts performances for students from West Marin schools–this month Ernesto Olmos and Balamcoatl shared traditional Mayan music and dance. Capoeira is coming up in November and then `Til Dawn A Cappella will round out the series in January.
We have many more performances in schools coming up, and our Assembly Performances are available across the Bay Area. Our Program Manager Morgan Schauffler can help you book Assemblies for your own site–you can give her a call at 415-457-4878 ext. 160 or just stop in at 917 C Street weekdays 11-4 to see “Walkable Comics” and talk with any staff member about all our exciting Fall activities and events!