Hays Post
The Hays Arts Council is presenting a limited series of summer classes for young people in the visual, performing and literary arts.
Classes start Monday and run through the last full week in July. Enrollment is open now, but is limited.
The HAC is running a smaller slate of classes and keeping enrollment low to allow for social distancing. The HAC will be sanitizing between classes.
Brenda Meder, HAC executive director, encouraged families to sign up youth as soon as possible, as classes will likely fill early.
"Everybody's got to make decisions on what is the right thing for them and their family," Meder said. "We are good with that, but we thought we wanted to at least offer some things because people do want engagement for their young people."
Classes run about an hour and range from two-day classes to week-long classes.
Classes are offered for children as young as 5 and old as eighth grade.
The youth art class instructors are as follows:
Visual Art Classes – Crystal Hammerschmidt is a past instructor for the HAC and recently returned to FHSU Art and Design to pursue her graduate degree.
Theatre, Acting and Playwriting Classes – Catherine Trieschmann is an award-winning professional playwright whose work has been produced nationally.
Short Story Writing Class – Linda Hohman is a retired high school language arts and gifted program instructor and a huge fan of the sci-fi and fantasy genre.
Hammerschmidt said students in the visual arts classes will be able to experiment with a variety of art styles and mediums.
"In all of those, I'll try to introduce artists from history, so they can see ideas and what other people have done to jump start their imaginations," she said.
Hammerschmidt, who is pursuing a MFA at FHSU with an emphasis in printmaking hopes to expose the students to some printmaking during her classes this summer.
"We forget how much printmaking is around us," she said. "When you say it, people don't really understand, but once you get your hands on you realize it is such a big part of the art world — making impressions and transferring images.
"We make prints everyday of our life, whether it is walking down the street with or feet or our hands on something."
You can find a complete list of classes and a registration form on the HAC website.
You can mail in the registration, bring it in to the art center at 112 E. 11th St. or call 785-625-7522.
A complete list of classes is listed below.
Note: The morning session of the "Patriotic Pride" class has been filled, but an afternoon session has been added.
