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2023 / 2024

VanGO

Building a Creative Future for Our Community

The MacLaren’s VanGo Program employs regional artists, connecting them to classrooms across Simcoe County and engaging over 6,000 students each year. In addition to VanGo, the MacLaren offers a range of youth programs, seasonal art camps and afterschool classes as well as workshops, events and exhibitions for audiences of all ages.

Students who are regularly engaged in the arts become greater thinkers and learners. MacLaren VanGo programs offer unique opportunities for students to meet and work with professional visual artists in the classroom and virtually. Students participate in meaningful cross-curricular activities that encourage creativity, skills development, and visual literacy, nurturing their appreciation of visual art and celebrating their strengths and abilities. VanGo artists are highly qualified, experienced art instructors dedicated to inspiring creativity in all students.

All 2023/2024 VanGo programs are offered in both virtual and in-person formats!

How to Book

MacLaren VanGo programs can be booked by telephone or email Monday through Friday throughout the academic year. VanGo Gallery and in-person school programs are available based on Public Health guidelines. When booking please let us know what program you are interested in, planned date and time, class size, and anything that will better help us serve your class. The MacLaren Art Centre requires that VanGo artists work with only one class at a time in both a virtual or in-person setting.

Note: Program fees are based on a maximum of 30 students per class and include materials – additional materials can be included for an additional fee. VanGo materials kits will be prepared and packaged according to safety standards and will be available for pickup one week in advance.

For more information on rescheduling, cancellations and payments, please contact Natalie Fisher, Education & Community Art Assistant at 705-720-1044 ext. 232 or natalie@maclarenart.com.

Primary

For Primary students, VanGo artists encourage the joy of creative expression through stimulating art materials and techniques, reinforcing their understanding of the visual elements and principles of design. We invite teachers to advise VanGo artists when a program can be connected to an area of study or a class activity.

Grades K-3

Colour Creators

Class Length: 120 min.

Cost: $325

This watercolour program engages students in the exploration
of primary and secondary colours, while delighting them
with interactive components. Three artworks are created by overlapping transparent colour, water-soluble crayon drawing and watercolour painting techniques. Students learn to recognize warm and cool colours and discover how colour can be used to express emotion.

Curriculum Connections: Visual Arts

Grades K-3

In the Making

Inspired by Canadian Petroglyphs

Class Length: 120 min.

Cost: $325

In this program, VanGo artists will present the importance of art as an early form of storytelling, by making connections to Canadian petroglyphs and sharing their own personal art and relationship to the community. Students will create a two-dimensional drawing, and a three-dimensional form by building an expressive clay vessel and carving a pattern on its surface.

Curriculum Connections: Visual Arts, Social Studies

Grades 1-3

Waterscapes

Inspired by French Artist Claude Monet

Class Length: 120 min.

Cost: $325

Students will be inspired by the Impressionist style of Claude Monet. Using acrylic paint and collage on an 11 x 14 inch canvas board, students create vibrant waterscapes through primary and tint colour mixing. The concepts of colour theory, space and texture are explored with emphasis on gestural painting techniques.

Curriculum Connections: Visual Arts

Grades 1-3

Cityscape

Class Length: 120 min.

Cost: $325

Working with a variety of printmaking techniques, students in this Softoleum printing program develop a basic understanding of city architecture and visual elements. Shape, line and texture are created using stamps, ink and rollers. The story is all about building a modern urban community.

Curriculum Connections: Visual Arts, Social Studies

Grades 1-3

Mixed Beasts

Class Length: 120 min.

Cost: $325

Students will have fun sculpting with clay, creating amazing hybrid creatures, and illustrating their natural environments. They will explore basic clay techniques and tools, developing fine motor skills and creative thinking. The focus is on using geometric solids and form as elements of art.

Curriculum Connections: Visual Arts, Geography, Science

Grades 1-3

Fantastic Forests

Inspired by Canadian Artist Emily Carr

Class Length: 120 min.

Cost: $325

Students will create an artwork inspired by the Canadian rural landscape. Using paint and collage, they will build visual images by cutting, tearing and layering shapes. Developing fine motor skills and creative thinking, the focus is on visual texture and space using organic and geometric shapes.

Curriculum Connections: Visual Arts, Geography

Grades 2-3

Starry Night

Inspired by Vincent van Gogh

Class Length: 120 min.

Cost: $325

Students will be spellbound when they try a centuries-old printing technique: paper marbling. The principles of design are discovered as students create two masterpieces using mixed media. Starry Night reinforces an understanding of warm and cool colours, silhouette and visual representation of depth. The focus is on expressive colour, rhythmic line and the correct use of scissors.

Curriculum Connections: Visual Arts

Junior

Our Junior VanGo Programs provide students with an opportunity for a graduated understanding of the principles of design through the creative manipulation of colour, line, texture, shape and pattern. Introducing curriculum-based content and contemporary issues (context) encourages young people to understand the social significance of works of art, both past and present.

Grades 4-6

Galaxy Quest

Class Length: 120 min.

Cost: $325

In this program, students will try their hand using traditional watercolour painting techniques and explore optical colour-mixing, visual texture and transparency as they create an out-of-this-world artwork representing space, the planets and more!

Curriculum Connections: Visual Arts, Science

Grades 4-6

Gargoyles and Grotesques

Inspired by Medieval Ornamental Design

Class Length: 120 min.

Cost: $325

Students will learn more about the decorative ornament of the medieval period. This program encourages creative thinking, challenging students to move from two-dimensional drawings and reference materials to creating three-dimensional forms using natural clay. The focus is on form and medieval symbolism.

Curriculum Connections: Visual Arts, History

Grades 4-6

Colour My World

Inspired by Canadian Artist Landon Mackenzie

Class Length: 120 min.

Cost: $325

Based on references to satellite imagery of the region, students will explore abstraction by creating a large artwork on watercolour paper using artist-quality watercolour paints, brushes, white oil pastel, wax resist and pen and ink. Using traditional watercolour techniques, the focus is on creating vibrant visual maps with an emphasis on colour theory, positive form and negative space, texture, line and transparency.

Curriculum Connections: Visual Arts, Geography

Grades 4-6

Distant Horizons

Inspired by Canadian Artist Tom Thompson

Class Length: 120 min.

Cost: $325

In this program, students will be inspired by the vibrant Canadian landscape paintings of Tom Thompson. Using artist-quality soft pastels on coloured paper, students will gain confidence in drawing with this medium by learning techniques to be applied in the completion of a final landscape masterpiece. The focus is on colour theory, layering, texture, and transparency.

Curriculum Connections: Visual Arts, Geography

Grades 4-6

Painted Portraits

Inspired by French Artist Henri Matisse

Class Length: 120 min.

Cost: $325

Express yourself! In this mixed-media program, students will create a vibrant self-portrait on artist-quality paper incorporating collage, drawing and paint, inspired by the Modern Art style
of Matisse. They will artfully apply their understanding of facial proportions, the principles of design and expressive use of tertiary colour for a personal masterpiece.

Curriculum Connections: Visual Arts

Grades 4-6

Vibrant Vistas

Inspired by Canadian artist Doris McCarthy

Class Length: 120 min.

Cost: $325

In this painting program, students will be inspired by the abstract art of Canadian artist Doris McCarthy. Using cut adhesive templates, students will create a vibrant rural landscape with acrylic paint on an 11 x 14-inch canvas board. The focus is on the principles of design and analogous colour.

Curriculum Connections: Visual Arts, Geography

Grades 4-6

Mythic Masks

Class Length: 240 min.

Cost: $650

Discover the varied purposes and meaning behind the mask. Students create a magical mask inspired by their favourite mythology. During the first day, they will create plaster masks over a pre-formed mould. On the second visit, these masks are painted with acrylic paints. The focus is on form and painting techniques. Teachers can request curriculum connections to the Social Studies (Egypt, Rome, Greece) or Literature curriculum.

Curriculum Connections: Visual Arts, Social Studies, Literature

Intermediate

Our Intermediate VanGo Programs provide students with an opportunity for a graduated understanding of the principles of design through the creative manipulation of colour, line, texture, shape and pattern. Introducing curriculum-based content and contemporary issues (context) encourages young people to understand the social significance of works of art, both past and present.

Grades 7-8

Pop Posters

Inspired by Pop Art

Class Length: 120 min.

Cost: $325

In this mixed-media and painting program, students will a create largescale poster in the style of Pop Art, expressing their personal interests and accomplishments through images and text. The focus is on combining visual elements, principles of design and painting techniques.

Curriculum Connections: Visual Arts

Grades 7-8

The Clean Shape

Inspired by Indigenous-Québecois Artist Rita Letendre

Class Length: 120 min.

Cost: $325

In this program, students will be inspired by the abstract paintings of Indigenous-Quebecois artist Rita Letendre. Students will explore the style of hard-edge abstraction on canvas board using masking tape as a tool to paint clean shapes, lines and overlapping edges. The focus is on colour theory, layering, texture and transparency, as well as geometric and spatial reasoning.

Curriculum Connections: Visual Arts, Math

Grades 7-8

Light on the Land

Inspired by Canadian Artist Lucius O’Brien

Class Length: 120 min.

Cost: $325

A review of Canadian landscape painters will inspire young artists to create monochrome landscapes. Using artist-quality watercolour paints, brushes and wax resist on watercolour paper, students learn about colour gradation, monochromatic scale, painting techniques, positive and negative space, texture and transparency.

Curriculum Connections: Visual Arts, Geography

Grades 7-8

Tag Me

Class Length: 120 min.

Cost: $325

In this program, students will create a silkscreen print image. Students will learn how to print two transparent colour layers and a multiple edition. Emphasis is on colour theory, the use
of silkscreen printing as graphic design and the creation of a personal symbol. With advance notice, VanGo artists can provide fabric inks for printing on t-shirts or canvas bags as supplied by the teacher and/or students.

Curriculum Connections: Visual Arts

Grades 7-8

EcoScape

Class Length: 120 min.

Cost: $325

Students will learn to create a series of unique prints based on a creative representation of micro-organisms in an ecosystem. Students design an image and carve it into soft linoleum. The impressions are inked and pressed to create a two-colour reduction print. The focus is on visual elements, principles of design, cooperative effort and printmaking as an art form.

Curriculum Connections: Visual Arts, Science

Book VanGo Online Now

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