Raising the bar: Heart Studio June Holiday Workshop

Children express themselves in many ways, differently. As the pace of formal education picks up, the "need" and the "want" in me to look for ways for the kiddo to "let loose" increase too. And with the kiddo, it is all about Art.

The kiddo doodles when she is free, when she is happy and even when she is thinking (as that seems to be the way she processes her thinking). She started her Art journey with Heart Studio since almost 4 years back where I first blogged about it here and she has been with the studio ever since.

I advocate unstructured play and the kiddo gets loads of this at home, on her own where she draws, does crafts, paints pebbles and draws some more. Because it seems to be the medium which allows her to unwind, we have pretty much stuck to her Art classes.

For the regular terms at Heart studio, Dumpling has pretty much done Animal Themed projects,

Buildings (this was a "work-in-progress" photo)

and even artist inspired pieces like this "Henri Rousseau" piece

(my favorite project so far not because it is pretty but the kiddo applied the technique in one of her recent school projects) 

Now, for Heart Studio, their Holiday Workshops take on a different approach. The projects are mostly designed as 1-day workshop (usually less than 3 hours) where the studio introduces a mix of genre and media for the children (see poster below!)

Now, what Dumpling really loves is that the holiday classes also offer her the opportunity to learn different things such as new technique (pointillism), use new media (clay), etc. This time round, the kiddo chose "The Dancer" workshop.

The painting is of 3 ballerinas and the style, abstract. What the kiddo like was that it was a new technique learnt (short strokes, "layer on" instead of blending) and that well, all girls like pretty ballerinas I suppose! :p

:: The Process
One thing that stands out is that while most of the students' work look really impressive but in all of the sessions, it is the process that the teachers focus on.

From the very first lesson when the kiddo was just about 4YO, the teachers at Heart have been working with the children on the same process: starting all artwork with basic shapes and outlines. This was the same as with the Dancers painting. The hubs was at the workshop earlier and he proudly told me that the kiddo was pretty much independent in doing the painting with Teacher Elma demonstrating or making certain suggestions along the way.

The learning objective of this project is to introduce the children to "Abstract Art" as well as getting them to learn how to layer on the paint and learning how to use colours harmoniously. :) 

For me, I was glad that Dumpling has a chance to learn how to paint human forms as that is often challenging.

From the years that she has been with Heart Studio, she has grasped the understanding of light and shadow as well as the technique of blending. For this piece, Teacher Elma shared that Dumpling was "challenged" as there was no blending involved but to work on layering different tones. The style was that the paint should be thick where there is "texture" too.

From a parent perspective, I like that with each workshop and with each term, Dumpling is always learning new things be it a different style, working with water colours in different ways, etc.

And the finished piece? Ta-da! 

For parents who are keen to try Art out, I do not even know where to begin on the great things Art does for children. Besides improving on areas such as fine motor skills and focus, Art empowers children to exercise their imagination and creativity. It allows children to have a means to express themselves and allow the brain to make connections in ways we cannot imagine.

Heart Studio offers highly personalised classes where even in theme based classes like these, the children are allowed to choose the angles, characters and colours they wish to work with. Just look at Dumpling's recent term project on "Cubism"!

Check this out: almost all the children were working on vastly different characters! How's that for child-led approach? 

Workshops, to me, are a great way for children to try out something new as well as allow parents to gauge the child's interest and if they are comfortable with the environment, the approach and the teachers. For us, I am glad to say that the approach still "works" even after almost 4 years. :)

Heart Studio is running its June Holiday workshops from 30 May till 10 June. Because I am nice (LOL!), I have pasted the schedule below for your convenience :p

If you wish to contact Heart Studio to find out more about their cost / availability, here's their contact details. The slots do run out pretty quickly so do call them earlier :) 

Address and Tel

1 Charlton Lane #01-04,

• Singapore 539631
• T: (65) 6554 7563
• 
  Disclaimer: We were invited to the Holiday workshop so that we can give our opinions about it. We are not compensated for the post. All opinions (and  artwork LOL) are entirely ours though your kid can bring home their piece of artwork if they were to enrol too!
    

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