Not Your Ordinary Art Camp
An artists’ life story, identity, worldly observations, and deepest desires can often be found behind the many shapes and colors of their work. Jazz Haywood teaches young girls to explore who they are, and embrace it, by incorporating all aspects of their personality into their artwork.
Coming from someone who attended an art camp at the age of nine, this art camp is not your ordinary art camp; in the best way possible. Camp kicks off with introductions to get the girls comfortable with each other, and with talking in front of groups of people in the future; a very valuable life skill. After all of the ice has been broken, the day’s lesson begins. The lesson opens up with a thought provoking question that leads to many insightful answers. When the lesson and discussion has concluded, the craft for the day is explained and started. Once the girls have finished their crafts they journal about what their piece means to them, and why they crafted their work the way that they did.
Coming from someone who is also quite frankly a terrible artist, you don’t have to be good at art to enjoy this art camp. Every week there is something fun to do that builds off of last week’s lesson. What really shocked me about this camp was the girls. No one was competing with each other to be the best. No one was worried about what anyone else was doing. Above all, no one thought anyone else’s art was better than theirs simply because another persons’ art wasn’t theirs. Everyone was proud of what they had made because they made it.
In a word, this art camp isn’t just about art. It’s all about girls having their own space to just be girls! The camp is built on the growing need for girls to have their own outlets to be themselves with each other. This art camp challenges young girls and adolescents to find, accept, and love themselves, something that most women don’t do until they’re well over ten years old. In times like these especially, girls only spaces are in high demand, and so are women like Jazz Haywood.