Endless inventive possibilities

Imagine a place where a child is encouraged to express their artistic potential in a fun, supportive, classroom environment with dedicated instructors. Classes could include “Cartooning” with “Mrs. Fab” or “Magic for Beginners” with Max Long or “Rhythm & Music” with Cheri Millsap.

“The Summer Arts Program for Youth offers several innovative classes designed to stimulate and encourage students to explore their creativity,” said program director Yvonne Benzinger.

Registrations are now being accepted for youths in grades K-12. Classes offered include arts and crafts, painting, drawing, cultural arts, kids cooking, chalk and collage, cartooning, woodburning, Native American crafts, rhythm and music, drama and guitar.

Some new classes this year are “Magic for Beginners,” “Fused Glass,” and a kids’ cooking and etiquette class called “Kids Cooking in Good Taste.”

“Our classes appeal to all grade levels and are a wonderful opportunity for students to explore the creative process, develop artistic skills and learn something new,” says Chelsea Cordova watercolor instructor.

In its ninth year, the program is scheduled over two sessions, June 20-29 and July 11-20. The arts program enrolls 130 to 150 students who take approximately 175 to 185 classes. There are 60 to 80 students attending on any given day, and 11 classes are offered each session.

All classes are three days, from 9:30 to 11:30 a.m., and are held at the Coeur d’Alene Harding Family Center at 411 N. 15th St. Each three-day class is $23 with additional varying supply fees.

Qualified local artists and teachers, experienced in working with arts projects and children, teach the classes and are paid a small stipend. Several instructors are members of the Coeur d’Alene Art Association.

“The instructors try to keep classes casual and fun while providing new or continuing experiences in areas of visual arts, drama and music,” according to Benzinger. “Our instructors are cost-conscious in their supply purchases and often share their own.”

Volunteers are recruited to assist instructors in the classroom.

“We recruit an average of seven to nine volunteers from parents, seniors and youth groups to assist the teachers in the classes,” Benzinger says.

Registration is by mail only. Class fees are nonrefundable after June 13, unless the class cancels. Registration brochures are available at Art Spirit Gallery, Frame and Easel, Burt’s Music and Sound, World of Art, Harding Family Center, Creative Elements, Borders Books, and in the tract racks at Coeur d’Alene City Hall, Chamber of Commerce, and the Coeur d’Alene, Hayden and Post Falls Libraries.

The Summer Arts Program for Youth was started in 1998 and is sponsored by the Coeur d’Alene Arts Commission, an agency governed by the City of Coeur d’Alene.

The Arts Commission consists of nine city residents who are appointed by the mayor and serve as a commission of the City Council. Their purpose, according to Benzinger, “is to encourage the development of artistic and cultural life and to ensure that the role of the arts in the community will grow and play a significant part in the welfare and educational experience of the citizens of Coeur d’Alene.”

The commission believed that one of the best ways to accomplish their goal was through arts education. They were aware there was a need for summer activities for children, especially in arts education. In 1998 they established a low cost program of quality arts instruction and activities – the Summer Arts Program for Youth.

Cora Kohler was the art commission director for the first two years, and Benzinger took over the reins in 2000.

A native of New York state, Benzinger has lived in Idaho since 1978. She graduated from the Albright Art School of the University of Buffalo in New York majoring in commercial art.

From 1979 on, Benzinger owned and operated a Coeur d’Alene home-based business, Custom Screen Prints. She worked many years as a freelance commercial artist designing menus, brochures, painting signs and showcards, screenprinting T-shirts, signs and banners.

From 1980 to 1990 Benzinger and friend, Carol Saathoff, established and operated Creative Critters, another home-based business. They made and marketed a line of kitchen-related gifts items such as aprons, placemats and bread boards.

Her husband’s job transfer took their family to Southern Idaho from 1993 to 1999.

While living there she served as president of the board of directors of the Pocatello Art Center – a position that prepared her well for her current responsibilities. She returned to Coeur d’Alene in 1999.

Benzinger works in watercolor, oil and serigraphy with occasional diversions into mixed media, collage and book arts. She has won the Art on the Green Poster three times and painted a life size moose for the 2004 Excel Foundation’s Coeur d’Alene Public Art Project.

In her spare time she is editor of the Coeur d’Alene Art Association’s newsletter, takes an occasional art workshop, and is president of the Christ the King Lutheran Women’s Missionary League. A current volunteer project has her painting murals at church and at the church’s fair food booth.

“It is fun and rewarding working with enthusiastic artists/instructors,” Benzinger says. “I like being involved in something that is supportive of the arts in this community.”

The Summer Arts Program is nonprofit and has been supported with grants from the Idaho Commission on the Arts and the National Endowment for the Arts. Scholarships have been provided by the Rotary last year and by the Coeur d’Alene Art Association this year.

“We will give 14 scholarships this year. St. Vincent’s, Children’s Village, and school faculty have helped identify children that would benefit from a scholarship,” says Benzinger.

For the past eight years the First Presbyterian Church donated the use of its classrooms but the program has been moved to Harding Family Center this year.

“This gives us larger classrooms, easy accessibility, playground and parking,” Benzinger says.

Coeur d’Alene Arts Commission member Iris Siegler teaches one of the classes, “Hands-On-Art,” and owns and operates Iris’ House Pre-School. Siegler has worked hard to establish a youth art program and believes strongly that children need to explore art from an early age.

“It has been incredible to have a program that involves children and art,” Siegler says. “I love the energy and excitement that kids generate – it is always inspiring to me.”