Staff writer Courtney Cutright brings us this story about students participating in a summer camp that’s the result of a collaboration between the Taubman Museum of Art and Roanoke City Public Schools. If you have any thoughts about the camp, the new exhibits or the Taubman’s programming, please leave a comment and share.

Roanoke students dabble in creative arts at the Taubman
A new partnership between Roanoke schools and the Taubman brings students into the museum to soak up inspiration and try out materials that “real artists” use.
By Courtney Cutright

hotos by Kyle Green | The Roanoke Times. Lucy Addison Middle School students look at part of the 'Memory of a Dream' mural by Kay Rosen at the Taubman Museum of Art in Roanoke. About 20 middle school students are participating in an art program at the museum.

Twelve-year-old Martin Armster said what he liked most about summer camp at the Taubman Museum of Art in Roanoke was “getting to use art glue, hot glue guns and to make the kind of art real artists make.”

Martin, a rising seventh-grader at James Breckinridge Middle School, is one of about 20 Roanoke students who spent four half-days last week at the museum, immersed in fine arts with a handful of art teachers.

The summer camp is a new partnership between the museum and the school division.

“It is really a great collaboration. We provide the space and split the expenses,” said Hillary Hardison, a museum staffer whose focus is education.

The camp is available at no cost to students. Breakfast, lunch and transportation are provided. A second session for another group of city middle school students is slated for early August.

In one of the museum’s classrooms, Martin used cardboard and shoe boxes as the bases to construct a house. He planned to add two front doors, three basketball goals, a flat-screen television and a video game console to finish the mixed media collage.

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