Field Trips: Visual Arts—The Studio
A typical field trip for your visual arts class often consists of guided tours given at your local art gallery where students learn about different styles and techniques of eminent artists and periods. However, art exhibits exercise only one of the senses—sight. Students should have the opportunity to use their others senses as well, by mastering their own brushstrokes, experimenting with their piece of fabric, or sculpting their own creation. Through studio workshops and projects, students will also gain an understanding of the conceptual and technical side of art. When they rely on their individual experiences to form opinions or appreciations for art, it is as genuine as the unique canvases displayed in the gallery.
Many of Canada’s art galleries—large and small—house studios offering students curriculum-based workshops that cater to all grade levels. At the Textile Museum of Canada for example, one of the workshops presents students with the opportunity to examine formal textile properties and apply them to textile materials in their hands-on gallery. Students discover how art and math unite to create beauty in our everyday lives, as well as the many other connections between art and the wider world. While at the Art Gallery of Alberta, students can partake in studio projects and experiment with media in order to better understand the process and concepts explored by specific artists. And over at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, students can dabble in creating a clay model of a fantastical creature following a workshop introducing creatures and characters from mythology that have inspired artists from various periods and cultures around the world.
Field Trip Opportunities:
Art Gallery of Alberta – Edmonton, AB
Living Arts Centre – Mississauga, ON
Mendel Art Gallery – Saskatoon, SK
Montreal Museum of Fine Arts – Montreal, QC
Textile Museum of Canada – Toronto, ON