Tuesday, November 09, 2010

River's Gallery

With two years of art classes under his belt and now daily access to art at preschool, River has made countless paintings, sculptures, and collages.  I can't bear to throw any of his creations out just yet, but we are amassing quite a pile and more comes home everyday.  I display what I can and store the rest, but I was inspired to take it a bit further during a conversation with the little artiste last night.

He was telling a story in which one of his sculptures was displayed in a museum and everyone came to look at it.  I told him we could do that at home: pull key pieces of his work out and display it like a gallery.  We could even have an opening with hors d'oeuvres and cocktails.  With the mention of snacks he was sold and with the thought of cocktails I was.

Together, River and I worked on choosing the artwork and hanging it (at least until he got bored).  Then the whole family assembled to mingle and enjoy his hard work.

 Thom and River prepare our snack table.

 Helping to pour sparkling cider.  One wall of paintings in the background.

 The sculpture table.  The clay piece is entitled "a-bug-a-bug"

 "Good guy ship with rain protection"

 "My Family" from this September and two untitled finger paintings from 2009 (his early work)

 River's favorite, "Untitled" in sand

 Our sitter, Megan, joined the festivities. 

Lila was very "into" the art; her brother was patient with her hands-on approach.

Overall it was a great success.  We had a wonderful time looking at some of River's past and current creations.  He really enjoyed talking about his work and I loved celebrating it in a memorable way.

If I had planned this more in advance, I would have taken the time to make cards with the name of each piece (if titled), the medium, and the artist's thoughts.  As it is, I think this will be just the first of many gallery openings our home will see.

4 comments:

Andy said...

That's really a very fun adventure for River and a great family memory for all.

Here's to many more "Gallery Openings" for River and Lila!

teamaldrich said...

LOVE THIS! If you had iTunes playing in the background with some snacks from Trader Joe's, I'd swear I was at Somerville's Open Studios ;-)

Summer Ryan Doyle said...

Itunes, check. Snacks from the Wine and Cheese Cask. Not too far off... :)

Anonymous said...

good idea. very fun practice for him, i'm sure.

Jonathan