Pet portraits raise funds
|
|
Seventh-grader Scarlett Notte works on a painting of a dog named "Boras" from a photograph at West Rutland School Tuesday afternoon. CASSANDRA HOTALING / RUTLAND HERALD |
Toolbox
By SARAH HINCKLEY Herald Staff - Published: May 16, 2007
Pose your pooch for a portrait painted or drawn by art students at West Rutland School and help raise money for a summer art camp.
Art teacher Nicole Graves and Paw House Inn owner Mitch Frankenberg are teaming up to get students involved in the fund-raiser to enhance their extracurricular art program at the school.
"What I love about it is, this gives the kids the opportunity to fund their own program," Frankenberg said. He is a member of the West Rutland Rotary, to which Graves gave a presentation imploring members to support the arts.
Those interested in having an artistic keepsake of their "best friend" — or friends — can donate from $25 to $1,000 to the West Rutland Arts Enrichment Fund towards a summer arts camp fund. Any money raised by the project beyond the designated amount will go toward school field trips to art museums, artists in residence and class time in local art studios.
Graves is looking to host a three-week summer camp, open to students in kindergarten through sixth grade, that will focus on arts from around the world.
"The kids are really interested in doing it. It's just getting the funding," Graves said.
She teaches an art course after school one day a week, in addition to her school schedule. Some parents can't afford the $10 fee for the class, she said. In a different after school art club she organizes, attendance is up to 18 students.
There is enough money on hand to fund one week of summer camp. There are enough kids signed up for two weeks of camp. Parents may be asked to donate a small fee towards the program, depending on how many portraits are painted.
In the first week, there have been six pet portrait requests, from as far away as New York City, and some are already finished and sent. Frankenberg is the one who fields the requests and then transfers the photos to Graves and her students.
"The kids are anxious for more," Graves said, adding that students ask every morning if there are more orders for them to do.
Students have a choice of using acrylic, watercolor or oil paints, or colored pencils to create the likeness of someone's furry family member from a photograph. It is mostly seventh- and eighth-grade students who have been working on the projects each morning.
"I'm very passionate about the school and this is a very worthwhile thing to create a call to action," Frankenberg said. He put a call out to all of his dog-owning clients and had a paws-itive response. "Dog people are special people anyway and they're looking for ways to spend money on their dogs."
For more information or to place an order, go to www.barkforthearts.org or call Frankenberg at 438-2738.
Contact Sarah Hinckley at sarah.hinckley@rutlandherald.com.
55