Arts Underground After School Program


Click Here To See Pics From the 2012/ 2013 Year

Free youth classes

The Arts Council of Greater Palatka would like to announce we have openings for students in our “Arts Underground” program held in the lower level of the Larimer Arts Center located at 216 Reid St. Palatka.  These classes are taught by Dana Woodard and Luke Taft.  Classes include theater and art.  Classes are held on Monday’s from 4 to 5:30 for ages 6 to 9.    Wednesday’s classes are for ages 10 to 14 and also are 4 to 5:30.  Come explore and have fun painting, drawing, acting, lighting, creating sets and much more. 

The Arts Council's second year of its Arts Underground After School Program is well underway and still has room for a few more students. The program combines different mediums and genres of creativity including performance art and visual art to wake up your child’s creative side and critical thinking skills. The combination of inventive and instructional learning equips students with knowledge and tools to help them succeed in virtually every aspect of their lives. Our program is designed to encourage students to think outside of the box, become problem solvers, and increase self confidence in a social setting. We achieve this by allowing students develop their wildest creative thoughts in a way that can be expressed meaningfully to others. Students not only learn the power of their individual minds, but also how to collaborate and help each other cultivate their ideas and realize the advantages and synergistic effects of group efforts.   For more information or to register for class please call Dana at
1-352-339-1040 or you can email artsinputnam.@aol.com.  
Executive Director Denise Aiken said, “The Arts Council believes the arts should be accessible for all youth and we are proud to present this program with no fees.”  This program is in its second year.  Again, class size is limited.

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Here students learned how to work with lighting for mood, effect, and technique.

(Above) Students place objects into a confined space so they could then experiment with how the objects would react to different lighting. They also were able to imagine the individual boxes as a stage set and learned how objects within a stage setting can effect the light and the mood of  a production.

(Left) Students took turns repositioning the light source and moving it to different types of music to create motion and enhance the mood of a simple shadow set. 

Participants in this exercise learned properties of both light and shadow as well as how lighting can be used as a tool to add drama , emotion, and even motion to a static theater set, making it "come to life".

Pictured above, students learned about sketching and composition. Students were instructed to choose elements of a backgrounds they wanted for a puppet shows that they were to perform. The students followed along on paper with the instructor's chalkboard sketches as everybody helped to place the elements within a composition. The photos below show students painting the resulting compositions as they learned about color, lighting, and perspective. Students also created their own paper puppets that they designed, named, painted, cut out and assembled.
The photos above show students performing acting exercises, face painting, and puppet skits. The acting exercises help the students to loosen up as well as how to control their motions. The face painting was part of a lesson in facial expressions and pantomime theater. The puppet skits introduced students to acting and playwriting. This is particularly helpful to younger students to gain an understanding of the many elements that creates a theater production including, visual art, stage setting, and witting. It also allows them to experience theater without being immediately thrust into a spotlight.

The video below shows a skit written and performed by students using pantomime, or acting with gesture. The students were encouraged to follow a simple story line and also to add improvisation where they felt it was appropriate to make the production more entertaining to the audience.

The Arts Council is the Designated Local Arts Agency for Putnam County and is supported in part by our members,
 the State of Florida, Department of State, Division of Cultural Affairs, the Florida Arts Council, the National Endowment for the Arts,

the City of Palatka, the Putnam County Commission and the Putnam County Tourist Development Council.
sponsors