Contact: Brian J. Foster Telephone: (312) 445-2749 Cellular: (773) 209-5749 Email: bfoster@urbangateways.org
URBAN GATEWAYS JOINS GREELEY ELEMENTARY FOR FINE ARTS WEEK 2013
Urban Gateways is once again teaming up with Horace Greeley Elementary School in Chicago’s Lakeview neighborhood for their annual Fine Arts Festival (Friday, May 31st from 9:45am to 3:15pm). With several teaching artists on hand and 2-3 tables dedicated to various arts activities, Urban Gateways plans to continue its long-standing partnership with the elementary school by bringing the arts to students in a fun, creative outdoor environment.
The festival, which coincides with Greeley’s annual Fine Arts Week, is an opportunity for kindergarten through eighth grade students to experience and share art in its many forms with their teachers and fellow students, as well as the Urban Gateways team. Past activities led by Urban Gateways teaching artists have included drum circles, mural painting, and designing decorative masks, providing students a wide range of arts projects and disciplines to choose from and explore. The arts remain a core pillar of Greeley’s curriculum in part due to Urban Gateways’ artist residencies which take place at the school throughout the year, despite cuts in arts education funding on national, state, and city-wide levels. Given the profound presence of the arts at Greeley, it’s no surprise that Fine Arts Week is a highlight of the spring season for students and staff to attend – and a pleasure for Urban Gateways’ teaching artists to be a part of year after year.
Says Urban Gateways artist Sonja Henderson of her visual arts residency, “Students at Greeley are dreamers as well as intellectuals… Greeley exposes young people to many different cultures, and art is part of that. We are enlightening young minds about what’s going on around the world – helping them understand what’s going on in the classroom in a more tactile, visceral way.”
Striving to educate and inspire young people such as the students of Greeley Elementary, Urban Gateways works to deliver high-quality, accessible arts experiences that advance their personal and academic growth. Professional artists engage Chicago’s youth in arts activities that build essential skills like creativity, collaboration and innovation, and improve their self-esteem and confidence necessary to succeed in life. Founded in 1961 with a mission to ensure that all young people have full access to the city’s cultural wealth, Urban Gateways works with artists, teachers, principals, community leaders, social service agencies and other partners to expand arts programs across the Chicago Metropolitan area, often in communities where such opportunities are in short supply. Urban Gateways strives to create alternative and positive experiences as a means to a brighter future for children and their communities.
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For more information on this event or Urban Gateways please contact Brian Foster, Director of Marketing and Sales, at (312) 445-2749 or at bfoster@urbangateways.org. You may also visit www.urbangateways.org/events.
UPDATE – PHOTOS from Greeley Arts Fest on June 3, 2013: