Art Drawn From Nature:
Kirk Newman Art School at the Kalamazoo Nature Center
KNC is collaborating with the Kalamazoo Institute of the Arts to offer classes at KNC this spring. Explore the beauty of the trails, spring blossoms, trees, animals, and scenery through a range of nature-inspired art courses.
Please note, registration for these programs is through the KIA. KNC and KIA Members receive a discount! Pre-arrival information will be shared with enrollees before each course starts.
Learn more about the classes at KNC below.
Writing in the Wild at KNC
Four weeks, Saturdays, April 12 – May 3, 10 am – 12:30 pm
Fee: $115/KNC or KIA Members, $135/Non-Members
Join us at the Kalamazoo Nature Center to read, write, and discuss a variety of nature-related stories, memoirs, and poems. Gain further appreciation for the ways that nature can inspire and infuse our own writing. Works like Wild by Cheryl Strayed and the poetry of Mary Oliver will be read out loud together and then used as sources of inspiration from which to create new work. During class we will spend time reading, writing, and sharing what we’ve written. We will also take short walks and write outside when weather allows. This class will demonstrate ways of accessing nature, in a cerebral way, through reading and writing, and in a physical way, by taking advantage of the Kalamazoo Nature Center in our own backyard.
Drawing Michigan Wildlife Workshop: Birds at KNC
Saturday, May 10, 9 am – 4 pm
Fee: $100/KNC or KIA Members, $120/Non-Members
Learn to draw wild birds at the beautiful Kalamazoo Nature Center. Drawing from both live and preserved specimens, acquire skills for field sketching to fully-rendered animal studies. Please bring drawing pads and graphite pencils as well as lunch and drinking water.
Befriending Death: Cycles of Life and Death in Nature Wednesdays, April 9 – May 21, 6:30-9 pm
Fee: $205/KNC or KIA Members, $225/Non-Members
Meet: Stryker Nature Preserve
The intention of this class is to understand ourselves in nature. To connect with cycles and seasons of life and death. We all have our personal and shared experiences of grief. Death of a loved one, climate anxiety, illness, and personal/social transitions being just a few examples. In this class, we will engage in group discussions, writings, nature journeying in order to create nature-based art around death and grief. It is the intention that students will leave this class with less fear of death and a deepened sense of our place in nature and community in these challenging times.
