Auction for Art at Village School

In April 2007 an “Auction for Art” raised over $6000 for art programs at Village Elementary School (880 W. Nippersink Road) in Round Lake. Many businesses and individuals in the community made donations and participated in this successful event to raise funds for our young artists.

These funds have been the means of providing exciting opportunities for our students so far this school year.

We were able to purchase large art prints of 16 famous paintings for our school library. Teachers are able to check these out for classroom use. Our librarian is working on plans to spotlight a different print and artist each month.

In early December our students enjoyed a wonderful assembly by Strokes of Genius in Glenview. Leonardo DaVinci was brought to life for our students in a dramatic, interactive assembly which involved student volunteers, a re-enactment of the painting of the Last Supper, scaffolding, and demonstrations of various inventions by DaVinci.

Our ArtSmarts Program is bringing local artists to the classrooms to teach students about famous artists and various art techniques. Our Guest Artists this year have been Sandie Bacon from Lake Bluff and Andrea Harris from Mundelein. These artists have exposed the students to knowledge they might not otherwise gain and given them hands-on experiences with creating their own artwork. The students learned about the work of Claude Monet and created watercolor postcards which were mailed home to their families. Next, the students learned about Leonardo DaVinci’s Mona Lisa and created their own portraits using Cray-Pas oil pastels. They later enjoyed creating paper cut-out pictures following the techniques of Henri Matisse. Most recently, the students learned to create their own foam stamps to make art prints like Keith Haring. Our final ArtSmarts presentations for the year will take place during the week of January 8-11, 2008. The students will be creating wire sculptures based on the work of Alexander Calder.

The culmination of our ArtSmarts Program will be our ArtSmarts Museum Night to be held at Village School on Friday, January 25, 2008, from 6:30-8:00pm. Each student will have 2 pieces of their ArtSmarts artwork on display, for a school total of over 1000 pieces of artwork. This gala event provides an opportunity for the children to proudly show their families and friends what they have learned in the ArtSmarts Program. Refreshments will be served. A Museum Gift Shop will sell art supplies as well as a special set of notecards created by 12 Village School students for the amazing price of $5. Proceeds from these sales will help fund next year’s art programs. Donations and volunteers are needed for this event.

Later in the spring, our students will enjoy additional art programs as the 6^th graders create a wall mural for our cafeteria, and the 1^st – 5^th graders create additional art in their classrooms. We will also be looking for art fundraising opportunities later in the year.

We are grateful to all of those businesses and individuals who donated to last year’s “Auction for Art” to make all of these art opportunities possible for the students at Village School.

If you have any questions about these art programs, please contact Village School Art Committee Chair, Shelley Trump, at (847) 546-7835 or Village School at (847) 270-9470.