Summer Camp 2023

Allens Lane Art Center Summer Art Camp is a fun, creative, and enriching experience for campers ages 5-15.

Week One: Makers Lab

June 20th – June 23rd

5-6: Imagination Station 2D & Fairytales on Stage

Morning: Imagination Station (Mixed Media)
Just a spoon full of imagination to spark creations made with the treasures of materials at the palm of your little one’s hands.

Afternoon: Fairytales On Stage
Costumes and plays and Happily ever afters is what to expect in this workshop filled with whimsical adventures and reenactments of classic tales as old as time!

7: Toy Making Studio & Improv tor Beginners

Morning: Toy Making Studio 
No, it’s not the north pole. But it will be magical to see what the kiddos come up with in our toy maker lab, where the possibilities are endless.

Afternoon: Improv For Beginners 
TO BE OR NOT TO BE! Campers act and react, collaborate, and use their imagination to make up convincing content in real-time!

8: Ceramic Space Age & Voiceover Fun

Morning: Voiceover Fun 
Silly accents wanted! Our campers will collaborate & record their voices over classic movie scenes, cartoons, and shows to recreate stories like never before.

Afternoon: Ceramics: Space Age Still life
Our explorers design out-of-this-world organisms and artifacts that they think best resemble not – yet – found – discoveries out of space!

9-11: Futuristic Fashion & Movement Through the Decade

Morning: Movement Thru The Decades
Groovy Baby! Time travel with us through dance poses and banging records to explore celebrated choreography throughout the ages with our in-house DJ & dance instructor.

Afternoon: Futuristic Costumes
Fortune tellers will not be needed for this workshop! Our visionaries will transport themselves to a futuristic era where their creations will be worn proudly, proving their pioneers; ahead of their time!

12-15: Wheel Throwing & Screenwriting

Morning: Ceramics – Wheel Throwing 101
This ancient art practice will connect you to the hands that once created what we call wonders today. You will learn the basics of wheel throwing and build your very own vessels and pottery, and learn how to decorate them with glaze.

Afternoon: SCREENWRITING SCRIPT!
You will learn the fundamentals of what it takes to be a great storyteller on screen! You will collaborate with others to create trailers of the genre of your choosing. You will later take those ideas and produce art that unfolds before our very eyes!

Week Two: Makers Lab

June 26th – June 30th

5-6: Imagination Station 3D & Book-to-Play

Morning: Imagination Station in 3-D (3-d Mixed Media)
If your little one had fun exploring their imagination with painting, collage, and drawing, they’ll be right at home with exploring a new chapter in three dimensions!

Afternoon: Book-To-A-Play
From costumes and books to plays on stage. Campers pick out these favorite classic short stories and reenact these adventures on stage!

7: Stop Motion Studios & Improv Comedy for Beginners

Morning: Stop-Motion Making Studio
Campers will take their magical creations and turn them into moving art. Can’t wait to see what these kiddos come up with in our animation lab, where the possibilities are endless!

Afternoon: Improv Comedy For Beginners
Did I do that? Campers will act and react, collaborate, and use their imagination to make up hilarious content in real-time!

8: Ceramic Magical Ancient Creatures & Improv Songwriting

Morning: Improv Songwriting
Jazz hands and “make you dance” lyrics! Our campers will collaborate, write and record songs over recognizable instrumentals. These catchy tunes will be so good you won’t get them out of your head all summer!

Afternoon: Ceramics: Magical Ancient Creatures
Our artistic archeologists will design legendary, mythical artifacts of a time that may have existed, and that leaves us questioning if it’s more than folklore!

9-11: Vintage Fashion & Improv Comedy

Morning: Improv Comedy For Beginners
Did I do that? Campers will act and react, collaborate, and use their imagination to make up hilarious content in real-time!

Afternoon: VINTAGE Costumes
Our fashionable HISTORIANS will teleport themselves to an era that most resonates with them and create costumes that will pay homage to those that blazed the trail before them!

12-15: Wheel Throwing & Movie Making

Morning: Wheel Throwing 101
You will continue practicing this ancient art and learn how to build, spin, and mold your very own bowls, mugs, and plates that can withstand the test of time!

Afternoon: MOVIE MAKING ACTION!
You will learn the fundamentals of movie making by studying cuts, camera angles, and more using your smartphone. You will collaborate on trailer ideas and produce art that unfolds before our very eyes!

Week Three: Art of Storytelling

July 3rd – July 7th

5-6: Legendary Puppet Tales & Poetry Club

Morning: Legendary puppet TALES
Once upon a time… Our youngest artists will design and build their very own handmade puppets that will later be used to create their own legendary stories!

Afternoon: Poetry Club
Rhymes, rhythm, and pause. Our young reciters will not only read, repeat, and recite poetry but they will also have the opportunity to create their own. In this workshop kiddos get to experiment with poems out loud in a variety of ways— including altogether!

7: Extra Large Portraits & Songwriters Edition

Morning: Extra Large Portraits
Extra! Extra! Young artists’ work becomes life-size! In this workshop, campers learn and exercise their painting skills by creating larger-than-life self-portraits that include items that tell a story of who they are.

Afternoon: Songwriters Edition
Move over, Beyonce! Our future hit writers will poetically compose and create lyrics that narrate a topic or feeling they want to express to the given melodies. They can partner up or work as a solo to perform their songs out loud.

8: Comic Character Development & Short Play

Morning: Short Plays
To be or not to be! Young actors will learn the basics of acting through games and improvisations and use short scripts, texts, and monologues to place themselves in unexpected characters’ shoes.

Afternoon: Comic Character Development
These young comic artists will learn the basics of creating a comic book/ graphic novel characters, including poses and emotions, to tell a great story. These original characters will then be used as the main attraction in their future comic art, storyboards, and strips.

9-11: Ceramic Mini Busts & Real Lite Skits

Morning: Real Life Skits
A day in the life of… you! These young adults will share their life story by creating short scripts that answer questions, tapping into their personalities and identities. They will be given the tools to act and can create in spoken word/poetry or play form to deliver their stories and bring them to life!

Afternoon: Mini Busts
Hail Ceaser! Campers will create mini Ancient Greek-inspired, expressive busts of themselves that best depicts their heroic, courageous moments!

12-15: Comic Character Development & Acting 101 Mini Scripts and Plays

Morning: Comic Character Development & Cover Art
Learn the art of Comics! Create complex characters and develop imagery that best captures your essence, your purpose, and your reality and create a unique Cover for your future comic.

Afternoon: Acting 101 Mini Scripts & Plays
Creative initiatives, imaginative costumes, serious voice projections – all for the love of acting! You will get to read, study, practice, and perform mini scripts and plays, highlighting interesting characters with a story to share!

Week Four: Art of Storytelling

July 10th – July 14th

5-6: Legendary Puppet Tales & Voice and Songmakers

Morning: Legendary Puppet TALES (continued)
Once upon a time… Our youngest artists will illustrate beautiful landscapes that will be turned into the perfect backdrops for their handmade puppets.

Afternoon: Voice & Songmakers
A true voice session! Our ensemble will be inspired by their favorite songs to collaborate and individually create lyrics that narrate topics and feelings they want to express! They will learn foundational skills in harmonizing, intonation, and breathing techniques to perform their songs out loud and in unison.

7: Tiny Portrait Series & Poetry 101

Morning: Tiny Portrait Series
Honey, I shrunk the kids! Well, more like your young artist will. In this workshop, campers will exercise their painting skills by creating a collection of mini self-portraits that portrays themselves as who they want to be.

Afternoon: Poetry 101
Poetry is thoughts finding words. Our young poets will continue with their word crafts by composing poetry, narrating and diving deeper into their understanding of image, rhyme, and personal expression.

8: Comic Book Pages and Posters & Myths Come to Life

Morning: Myths Come to Life
Release the Kraken! Young actors will explore, read and act out myths turned legendary tales of a time steeped in adventures and wonder. They will bring these stories to life through plays and lively reenactments.

Afternoon: Comic Book Pages & Posters
These comic book artists will now narrate the stories of their original characters using their creations from last week’s class! They will also convert their character development sheets into poster art!

9-11: Personality Pots & Movement in Nature

Morning: Movement in Nature
A relaxed, improv approach to motion and meditation with collaboration, play, and creative free movement, including nature as their muse, & music to carry their moves.

Afternoon: Personality Pots
Campers will build original creations that are inspired by and best resembles the best of their character traits! Will you be able to guess your child’s vessel.

12-15: Comic Book Art & Stage Acting

Morning: Comic Book Art
This is what Stan Lee dreamed of! Future comic artists are narrators of their own stories! You will learn the tricks of the trade and sample lessons focusing on page composition, scripting for comic books, and more!

Afternoon: Stage Acting
Creative initiatives, imaginative costumes, and serious voice projections – all for the love of acting! You will continue your scene studies and perform these mini scripts with amazing stories to share!

Week Five: The Weird, The Wonderful, The Wacky!

July 17th – July 21st

5-6: Wearable Art with Clay & A Play in The Park

Morning: Wearable Art with Clay
Our youngest group of artists get to pour their imaginations into paper, then clay, in this wearable art workshop. With some creativity [and don’t forget fun!], these campers will walk away with prizes of their own making!

Afternoon: A Play in the Park
If you build it, they will come! These performing artists will learn, through play, some acting skills that encourage the ability to perform improv scenes & collaborate with others in a devising setting to quickly create performable work. They will create and play out scenes at our neighboring Allens Lane Park!

7: Botanical Art Prints & Harry Potter: Improv and Playwriting

Morning: Botanical Art Prints
Kiddos explore the fundamentals of the printmaking processes and will focus on the comprehension of techniques and materials and their relationship to the printed image and visual concepts while studying botanical illustrations for inspiration.

Afternoon: Harry Potter: Improv & Playwriting
“Don’t let the muggles get you down.” What a magical opportunity for your little one to enjoy, express, and act out some wizardry as they go on an enchanted adventure at Hogwarts School. These playwriters will have a week of improv & writing sessions that will soon turn into a mini-play, acted out on the big stage!

8: Knitting and Yarn Bombing & Improv Dance

Morning: Improv Dance
Do you have the next viral Tik Tok dancer? Well, this class is for them! Enjoy a fast-paced choreography class filled with collaboration, play, and creative on-the-fly dance moves where your kiddos become movement creators! Add a DJ to the mix? And its a party!

Afternoon: Yarn Bombing
Radical yarning to the rescue! Campers will not forget this class and all its basic teachings of knitting and the amazing art movement of yarn bombing — decorating and reclaiming cold and plain public places surrounding our art center!

9-11: Pollinator Power! & Myths Come to Life

Morning: Myths Come to Life
Release the Kraken! Young actors will explore, read and act out myths turned legendary tales of a time steeped in adventures and wonder. They will bring these stories to life through plays and lively reenactments.

Afternoon: Pollinator Power! Artists will be creating artwork for Pollinator Power!, an installation that will be in Woodmere Art Museum’s Helen Millard Children’s Gallery in September. Using recycled materials, artists will work on making a whole environment with large-scale plants, critters, earth, and sky.  They will get to draw, paint, make sculpture, and work with fabric. They will be inspired by observing nature, using their imaginations, and learning about pollination and its role in helping our planet. Artists can collaborate or make their own individual projects, with plenty of personal attention, freedom, and support. It will be exciting to work together to create art as a way of creating climate justice and the world we want.

12-15: Photography Series & Poetry 101

Morning: Photography Series
Young photographers in the making get a chance to create beautiful collections of their photography using hand-built pinhole cameras, smartphones and historical processes such as cyanotypes. You’ll learn about composition, camera angles, balance, and color theory.

Afternoon: Poetry 101
Poetry is thoughts finding words. Immerse yourself in the art of poetry by learning about composition and narrating while diving deeper into your understanding of image, rhyme, and personal expression.

Week Six: The Weird, The Wonderful, The Wacky!

July 24th – July 28th

5-6: Monsterous Plates & A Play in The Park

Morning: Monsterous Plates
They roared their terrible roars and gnashed their terrible teeth! … Campers will make a collection of monster-inspired plates that even their own creations wouldn’t resist to eat off them.

Afternoon: A Play in the Park
What a beautiful world! These actors will continue their learning through play workshops, and create improved & devising skits that come to life at our neighboring Allens Lane Park!

7: Under The Sea Art Prints & Harry Potter: Improv and Play

Morning:  Under the sea Art Prints
Campers continue to explore the printmaking processes and will apply techniques and materials and their relationship to the printed image and visual concepts to study and create under-the-sea-themed prints.

Afternoon: Harry Potter: Improv & Play
The magic continues! Campers will carry on with their adventures at Hogwarts School. Harry Potter’s journey to wizardry will inspire these performances —And these playwriters will be able to act out their collaborative play on the big stage!

8: Fabric Dying and Textile Art & Improv Comedy

Morning: Improv Comedy
Did I do that? Campers will act and react, collaborate, and use their imagination to make up hilarious content in real-time!

Afternoon: Fabric Dying & Textile Art 
Unbeweavable textile art! Students will have their hands filled with fabric pieces, yarn, non-toxic dyes, needles & threads, and more to create original, hangable art with nothing but the basic teachings of knitting/weaving, pasting, and dying techniques and great imagination!

9-11: Alebrijes Sculptures & Improv Dance

Morning: Improv Dance
Do you have the next viral Tik Tok dancer? Well, this class is for them! Enjoy a fast-paced choreography class filled with collaboration, play, and creative on-the-fly dance moves where your kiddos become content creators! Add a DJ to the mix? And its a party!

Afternoon: Alebrijes Sculptures 
¡Bienvenidos young artist! In this workshop, your kiddos will enjoy the creation of brightly colored Mexican folk art paper sculptures inspired by Manuel Jiménez Ramírez! Campers will honor this traditional practice by creating their own fantastical creatures while being taught the basics of color theory, contrast, and texture.

12-15: Photography Collage & Improv Comedy tor Beginners

Morning: Photography Collages 
Collect, crop & paste! Young photographers will experiment and create beautiful collections of collaged photography and cyanotype prints to narrate stories, personal messaging, and memories!

Afternoon: Improv Comedy
For Beginners Did I do that? Campers will act and react, collaborate, and use their imagination to make up hilarious content in real-time!

Week Seven: Artists to Artists

July 31st – August 4th

5-6: Paint like Kusama, Paint like Pollock & A Mini Play

Morning: Paint like Kusama, Paint like Pollock
Our youngest artists will have the pleasure of studying two famous artists, Yayoi Kusama & Jackson Pollock. They will learn the basics of painting images, how to take care of tools, and create their own masterpieces!

Afternoon: A Mini Musical Play
This workshop will have young actors collaborating and combining music, drama, costumes, and even scenery into a single art form.

7: Mobiles (Alex Calder) & Creative Movement

Morning: Mobiles (Alex Calder)
This class combines a little science and art to create beautiful hangable mobiles inspired by Alexandar Calder. These young artists will use colors, shapes, and some ingenuity to build functional works of art.

Afternoon: Creative Movement
The perfect class for an intro to dance training. Our performers will understand the importance of movement through rhythm, songs, exploration games and improv. This exposure will help campers with their flexibility and endurance while leaving them tapping for more!

8: Extra Large Collection Mattise Collage & Mini Musical

Morning: Creating a Mini Musical
This workshop will leave campers breathless! They will have an active involvement in the process of collaborating and combining music, drama, costumes, and even scenery into a single art piece. They will gain a better understanding of the visual and aural power and beauty of opera art forms.

Afternoon: Extra Large Collection: Matisse
Collage art Campers will create collages inspired by the great collage artist Henri Matisse. Using nature and patterns as inspiration to develop a series of works connected in theme.

9-11: Basquiat & Haring Inspired Ceramics & Voice and Songmaker

Morning: Voice & Songmakers
A true voice session! Our ensemble will be inspired by their favorite songs to collaborate and individually create lyrics that narrate topics and feelings they want to express! They will learn foundational skills in harmonizing, intonation, and breathing techniques to perform their songs out loud and in unison.

Afternoon: Basquiat & Haring Inspired Ceramics
This funky duo will get any artist’s creative juices flowing. The colors, forms, and styles of these two great artists, Jean-Michel Basquiat & Keith Haring, will inspire great clay collections worthy of any display!

12-15: Paintings like Mark Bradtord & Hand and Wheel

Morning: Hand & Wheel
You will practice Wheel throwing and hand-building, creating their very own vessels and pottery inspired by today’s ceramic artist, Tasha Rene.

Afternoon: Larger-Scale Paintings like Mark Bradford
In this fun painting class inspired by Mark Bradford, a contemporary artist from L.A., you will learn about abstract painting and mixed media. Abstract, filled with form, movement, and layered material, will leave viewers awwing at these unique expressions of creativity.

Week Eight: Artists to Artists

August 7th – August 11th

5-6: Paint like Pablo, Paint like Kandinsky & Dance Like Martha

Morning: Paint like Pablo, Paint like Kandinsky
“Every child is an artist…” Our youngest artists will continue with their painting workshop by studying two more famous artists’ styles, Pablo Picasso and Wassily Kandinsky.

Afternoon: Dance like Martha
Dancers will learn the basics of contractions and basic floor work, all inspired by Martha Graham’s modern dance style. They will build on their core strength and limberness in a fun and encouraging environment.

7: Wire sculptures (Alex Calder) & Silent Film Project

Morning: Wire Sculptures (Alex Calder)
Our young sculptors continue their studio studies of Alexandar Calder. In this session, they will create playful wire sculptures based on their designs and imagination.

Afternoon: Silent Film Project
fin! Classic black and white scenes as the most personable characters lit up the big screen! Our campers will collaborate on their very own stories, act it out and bring it to life with this timeless style – with props and fun.

8: Slime Art Sculptures & Poetry 101

Morning: Poetry 101 
Poetry is thoughts finding words. Our young poets will continue with their word crafts by composing poetry, narrating, and diving deeper into their understanding of image, rhyme, and personal expression.

Afternoon: Slime Art Sculptures 
This quirky sculpting workshop continues with building up figurative or abstract concepts — but this time, we will be adding slime to the mix!

9-11: Collage like Njideka Akunyili Crosby & Silent Film Project

Morning: Silent Film Project
fin! Classic black and white scenes as the most personable characters lit up the big screen! Our campers will collaborate on their very own stories, act it out, and bring them to life with this timeless style – with props and fun

Afternoon: Collage like Njideka Akunyili Crosby 
This workshop will teach campers to collage on a whole new level. With the exemplars of Njideka Crosby’s artwork, these young artists will develop pieces that combine texture, patterns, and images that highlight important memories in their lives.

12-15: Paintings like Mark Bradford & Hand and Wheel like Jim McDowel

Morning: Hand & Wheel
Campers will practice wheel throwing and hand-building, creating their very own vessels and pottery inspired by today’s artist Jim McDowell.

Afternoon: Sculpt like Franz West: Paper Mache Lamp Shades 
Let there be light! No need to run off to Target. You will create your own stylish illumination with these Franz West-inspired lamp shades.

Register for Summer Camp

June 20th – August 11th

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Mount Airy, Philadelphia

Since 1953