RadBodega Dance Floor - photo © Nancy Fitzpatrick

What can we say – the best, biggest, craziest most creative IS183 Art School gaLa ever!  600+ attendees flooded East Coast Refinishing in Pittsfield, MA on Saturday, March 6, 2009 to enjoy an original street art inspired dance party and silent auction in support of the school.

Fantastical elements included a spray painted cargo van as dj cage, go-go dancers in industrial cages of rebar and bike parts, a hot dog vendor, floating toxic swill bar, best silent auction in the county and dance til you drop party featuring music by DJ BFG, lights by Sean McLaughlin and Ruralliance and projections by Drew Suto.

All proceeds went to support programming and outreach of IS183 Art School – a non-profit community art school encouraging people of all ages, means and skill levels to enrich their lives through hands-on experience in the visual arts.

Hope Sullivan – Director of IS 183 Art School

By Jenn Smith, Berkshire Eagle Staff

IS183 Art School of the Berkshires is expanding afterschool art programs in some Pittsfield elementary schools.

This fall semester, approximately 120 students between Morningside Community and Williams Elementary schools participated in an eight-week art program at their respective sites, with IS183 art faculty and school volunteers.

“At Morningside, the program is entirely grant- funded and clearly has a significant impact on the kids participating,” said Hope Sullivan, director of the nonprofit art school based in Stockbridge.

She said the Learning Through Arts program was piloted back in the spring at Morningside, for students in kindergarten through Grade 5. The program was so popular that IS183 and Morningside received grants from The Berkshire Bank Foundation, Berkshire Life Insurance Company of America, Legacy Banks Foundation, Morningside Advisory Council, Price Chopper’s Golub Foundation, TD Bank, and The Robbins-de Beaumont Foundation, to bring the program back to Morningside for 24 weeks during the 2009-10 school year.

When parent Amy Santos, a member of the Williams Elementary School PTO, heard about the Learning Through Arts program, she and other parents soon took an interest in having the program in their school.

“It’s hard to get to Stockbridge and it’s hard to get our kids extra time in art,” she said. “For kids in sports and music, there are other programs and extra classes at the school, but there’s no additional art. So this is great. My kids love it.” The Williams PTO did some fundraising for scholarships for the program, which costs $60 per student for an eight-week session, and ultimately enrolled about 30 children.

For both the Williams and Morningside programs, IS183 art faculty go the schools once a week, with art supplies and lesson plans that comply with the Learning Standards for Visual Art for elementary school students, as mandated by the state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education.

This fall, artist Karen Arp-Sandel taught in both the Morningside and Williams programs. At Morningside, children learned about Mexican heritage art and the art associated with the Day of the Dead holiday. At Williams, she used various books to teach kindergarten, first- and second-graders about animals and habitats. Most recently, the Williams students learned about panda bears and Japanese-style brush painting.

“I love art. I guess if I couldn’t do it here, I could do it at home,” said Williams first-grader Alexa Yasinski. “But this is fun.”

“During the whole [art-making] process, I’ve noticed a lot of kids start to bring in their own things related to the lessons,” said author Nancy Castaldo, who used her own educational book “Leap Into Space” to help students create projects like drawing the moons of Neptune and creating stories about aliens with matching clay sculptures.

Fourth-grader Serena Wang was one of those students who went to the library to bring a space book back to the art class. “See,” she said, thrusting the book up towards Castaldo’s eye level.

“We cover a lot of different topics, which is cool because you get to learn about something then create art about it,” said Williams fifth-grader Vincenzo Coppola.

His classmate Ian Sacco nodded. “Yeah, I just wish we had more time.”

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Click here to learn more about the Learning Through the Arts Program!

Click here to support IS183!

Radioactive Bodega

Saturday, March 6, 2010

East Coast Refinishing

4 Industrial Drive, Pittsfield

6PM dinners at private homes*

reserve your tickets soon!

8PM dance party and silent auction

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Choose a level below and click ‘add to cart’ to purchase tickets. Ticket purchases are made through Paypal. You will have the opportunity to specify the quantity of tickets you would like to buy once you enter that secure system.
You can also purchase tickets by phone at 413.298.5252 x100.

*Please note: to finalize which dinner you will attend, and how your name should be listed at the door, a committee member will contact you directly once the full list of hosts has been finalized.

Patron – $250.00

for a full list of Patron level benefits click here

Dinner/Dance – $150.00

for a full list of Dinner/Dance level benefits click here

Dance Party Only – $50.00

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