Notes from the Intern: Favorite Memories

While I still have a couple weeks left interning at the Cook Arts Center, I’ve been taking the time to reflect on the past four months that I’ve been here. I have been thinking a lot about what I’ve learned during my time of interning, I have also began to realize just how many great memories I have so far. My blog post this week is a small collection of my favorite memories at the Arts Center.

A couple weeks ago, the weather got warmer and many of the art projects headed outside. One day, I had two boys in my group and they begged me to go outside and play with them in the playground. So as we headed out, I quickly thought about some ways to incorporate art into our playground fun. First I had them find a giant pile of rocks. Then I challenged them to see how high they could balance the rocks on to each other. After they worked on that for a while, I told them to make a cool design that incorporates the element of balance. As they worked, I began to tell them about the movement Earthworks. I told them about the Spiral Jetty and other cool projects that use natural objects to create art works. While the whole activity was fun, my favorite part happened towards the end of our art project. One of the boys had just made a really beautiful design with the rocks when all of a sudden, he stood up and lifted both hands in the air and yelled at the top of his lungs, “I LOVE NATURE!!!!!”

One day I brought in whole sheets of bubble wrap for each child. I had them sit down at a table and then taped the bubble wrap onto the table. They then went crazy with painting their sheet. After the sheet was completely covered with paint, we took paper and pressed it completely over the wet paint. When you pull back the sheet, a print is made on the paper. The kids loved this project, which is always fun. One girl in particular loved it. Every time that she pulled her sheet back, she would squeal with delight at the results. We must have made at least 6 or 7 prints, and every time she’d look up at me with a huge smile on her face and the cutest little laugh would pop out.

The last story I’ll share happened just yesterday. A new family just started attending the Arts Center. On the walk back to the Arts Center, one of the girls picked a bunch of dandelions. The older sister told her that if she rubs the dandelion on her nose a boy will like her the next day. She seemed pretty confused on what to do at this point. She really wanted to rub some on her nose, but she didn’t really want a boy to like her. So I dipped my nose down into the dandelion to let her know it was ok. I, of course, then got a bunch of yellow on my nose, which resulted in a bunch of laughs. We continued walking down the sidewalk when suddenly I look over at the little girl and her face was absolutely covered in yellow pollen!

** Shelly is a senior at Calvin College majoring in English and Studio Art. She shares her experiences interning at the Cook Arts Center on this blog once a week. **