A natural media for kids

ELLENSBURG -- Seashells, beeswax, pine cones, flower petals and sand dollars crowd the classroom shelves. It is an artist's wonderland where kids are able to sift through and pick the perfect object to make their next creation a possibility.

Art dangles from the ceiling and the walls are covered with drawings, and in the middle of it all, a wood-stick design hangs from a ceiling beam. Outside on the sidewalks, radial designs can be found; in entryways to empty buildings, the children have put up stick and seashell designs.

At Gallery One Visual Art Center in Ellensburg, kids are hard at work creating and designing artwork at the summer art camp. They are learning how to plan an idea and execute it. In the end, they will have created a piece of art from their own imagination by using techniques of world-renowned artists such as Andy Goldsworthy. The kids in this camp are taught to make things without basic tools. They are challenged to think of ways of designing around obstacles.

"This camp puts art together without the use of glue or string," said Becky Parmenter, art camp instructor.

Goldsworthy is a British artist whose artwork is on display all over the world -- in the United States, England, Scotland, the North Pole, Japan and the Australian Outback. He works with whatever he finds: twigs, leaves, stones, snow, ice, reeds, thorns.

Laurie Hansen, youth education coordinator/instructor, didn't know of Goldsworthy until a friend introduced her to his work through a video.

"I thought it could be something that the kids could get a grasp on," said Hansen, "and they have."

Before this art camp session started, kids and parents received a letter asking them to find objects such as rocks, sticks or seashells. Parmenter found all kinds of seashells while vacationing on the beach, and brought them back to the camp. Beeswax was also donated, and the kids figured out that it could work as a replacement for glue.

On the sidewalks outside, they got to work as teams putting together different installations on various street corners such as Fourth and Pine. Entryways, which no longer had a business, got art.

"It's a lot better to look at than graffiti," said Carol Huber, owner of Monarch Salon. "I think it's great, gives them something to do and work their curious minds."

Behind the Ellensburg Bull sculpture, in a corner shaded by pine trees and brick buildings on Pearl Street, the kids made a radial design.

"We're so used to using glue and paint in our art," said Dylann Loverro, a 9-year-old art camp student. "The challenge was fun. I like to do new things that are challenging."

At the end of this camp, the classroom shelves were bare, cleared off and waiting for the next camp to fill them up again.

In the coming weeks, kids will be learning how to make mosaics and the art of photography. But their minds will keep going and their hands will keep busy inventing their next creation.