40th Anniversary Fine Arts Camp Art Show is at Challenge Alaska

Come Out for a Fine Arts Friday

By Tim Lydon

TNews Board of Directors

One of Girdwood’s hottest and longest running arts events happens this Friday, when participants in the Girdwood Fine Arts Camp put on their annual art show. The potluck gathering is free and open to the public and runs from 6:00 to 8:00 pm at Challenge Alaska.

 “The show is a celebration of what the kids havedone,” says Tommy O’Malley, who helps organize and teach the camp. “It’s important for them to have everyone come in.”

 O’Malley started the camp with Annie Olson in 1986, making this its 40th year. They first operated out of a log cabin in Old Girdwood, then graduated to a formerlaundromat space at the Girdwood trailer court before landing at Challenge over ten years ago.

“We’re not trying to teach mastery here,” says O’Malley of the two-week camp. “We’re just exposing them to different mediums and teaching them how to use new tools.”

At this year’s camp, says O’Malley, students soldered, chiseled, carved, painted, cut glass, worked with digital mediums, and fired silver jewelry, among many other activities. It’s an ambitious spread of mediums that O’Malley says is only possible because of the artists and volunteers that come to teach.

Jimmy Riordan, executive director of the Girdwood Art Institute, which puts on the camp each year, saysthat organizers try to strike a balance betweenmaintaining structure while also promoting freedom and creativity for the kids.

 “We don’t want it to feel regimented like a school day,” he says.

Riordan says the camp invests in high-quality art supplies and safely exposes students to mediums such as carving with knives that they are not likely to learnin school. The camp also pays a premium to visiting artinstructors such as this year’s independent artist and retired UAA professor Mariano Gonzales, who taught a silversmithing workshop that was a favorite among students.

Some of the artwork made during the camp. (Photos courtesy Girdwood Fine Arts Camp)

The Girdwood Art Institute keeps student tuition lowthrough the support of grants, volunteers, parents, and Challenge Alaska. The cost is $350.00 for four hours of daily instruction Monday through Friday for two weeks, which is inexpensive compared to similar camps. The camp also offers scholarships.

Riordan, who has helped with the camp for over twenty years, describes Friday night’s art show as a culmination. That day, he says, students transform the Challenge space from a working studio, where the floors are covered in paint-splattered tarps, to a gallerywith finished artwork that is matted, hung on the walls, and displayed on tables. Each student chooses which of their pieces they want to exhibit.

“They’re really amped up by the time of the show,” says Riordan, adding that an annual highlight of the show is a play performed by the kids and directed by O’Malley.

This year’s 40th anniversary is also a highlight for organizers, who have now seen generations of Girdwood youth pass through the camp. They include June Daniel, who first attended the camp as a five-year-old and now teaches at the camp and serves on itsall-volunteer board of directors.

“The kids teach us how to make art every year,” say Daniel, still smiling as she cleans up at Challenge after a full day of teaching. “They intuitively know how to create, and they’re not limited by inhibitions. They remind us what it’s like to create freely.”

The camp is a hit among the kids, too, who are grouped into a primary camp aged 4-8 and an intermediate camp aged 9 to 14. Students work in small groups, often with one instructor per six kids.

“It’s really fun,” says Isabel Love, who at ten years old is in the camp for her third year. “We get to try different things like carving and working with clay and silver. And the instructors are great.”

 Learn more at www.girdwoodfineartscamp.com

Girdwood Fine Arts Camp Instructor Tommy O’Malley celebrating the 40th Anniversary.