Outdoor Painting Fun
One of the camp art projects available for the girls at Rockbrook is painting. As part of our arts program, the painting and drawing activity is always popular. When the weather is dry, we’ll often meet for this activity outside, somewhere on the camp property that offers a unique subject or inspiring view. It’s so nice to be outside with your friends working on your painting, getting the colors right, thinking about the composition, and experimenting with different textures. These kinds of crafts and arts projects turn out awesome!
And of course, at camp there’s always a chance to add dressing up to any activity. “Let’s put on our most colorful clothes when we go to Painting.”
Wheel-Thrown Ceramics at Camp
“Can you learn how to use the potter’s wheel?”
Yes, you can! The Rockbrook ceramics camp activities lets campers improve their pottery skills so they can learn to throw pots on the wheel. After practicing other ceramics techniques, specifically hand-building methods like pinch, coil and slab pottery, it’s exciting to learn about the potter’s wheel. You’ll work on 4 steps:
- Centering the clay on the wheel.
- Opening up the center of the clay.
- Pulling up the walls and shaping the piece.
- Trimming the base of the piece.
Of course there’s lots of detail to each of these steps, but this brief outline gives you a sense of what’s involved in learning to throw ceramics on the potter’s wheel. Over a few weeks at camp, you’ll be surprised how good you can get and be amazed at the cool things you can make. Maybe next summer, you can finish a whole set of matching mugs!
P.S. If you want to read more about it, check out the book Wheel-Thrown Ceramics, by our friend Don Davis. It’s the best one around.
