Free Family Sundays
Join us every Sunday from 2-5 p.m. in the Joseph Education Center Studio for art-making activities the entire family can enjoy.
Free Family Sundays is an art program for families with children ages 6 to 9. This free, weekly program is designed to teach children how to think and see like artists. Children and families are encouraged to work together, use their imagination, and learn through making. Led by experienced teaching artists, workshops are inspired by rotating exhibitions as well as the permanent collection.
Free Family Sundays at Home
Get downloadable craft ideas and art projects inspired by works in the Museum’s collection. Each art project comes with the story behind the artwork or artist that inspired the project, the required materials, and the instructions.
Once you’re finished with your creation, snap a picture and share it with us on social media using the hashtag #ArtBMAFromHome for a chance to be featured on our social media accounts!
Many artists carry a sketchbook everywhere they go. We’ll show you how to create a mini sketchbook to record your feelings throughout the day.
Today’s project teaches you how to roll your own beads to make a bracelet to give to a family member. You can choose colors that are special to you and your family.
Over 3,200 years ago, a stone carver in Egypt used a variety of hand tools to sculpt an image of Pharaoh Ramesses II (1303–1213 BCE). He and many other stone carvers worked together to create magnificent relief sculptures on the exterior of buildings in the pharaoh’s city. You can create your own relief sculpture at home using a good old-fashioned bar of soap.
In this project, you will use clay to make a coil pot by piecing together coil shapes. The coils may remind you of human hair–think about the many ways hair can be changed to create different styles.
Have you ever tried to work but just couldn’t concentrate? Some artists use mindful drawing to focus on the present moment and use their full concentration to create works of art. Try mindful drawing before starting your homework or a class project.
For this project, you will create a collage of an imaginary creature with features that show its special abilities.
In this activity, we’ll use bold colors and shapes to create a miniature playground sculpture. What colors are playful to you? Which shapes bring you joy? What is your favorite part of a playground? Think about these details as you create your sculpture.
Shapes and colors can create different feelings – the same way music does. In Bubbles, artist Thomas Hart Benton explores this idea using a style of painting called Synchronism. Synchronism encourages artists to create harmonies with colors and shapes to make paintings, similar to the way musicians create harmonies to make music. Today we will explore shapes, feelings, and colors and create a drawing.
A still life is a painting or drawing of a group of objects (often fruit, flowers, or other items) arranged in any way the artist chooses. In New England Still Life, artist Rebecca Salsbury James painted an arrangement of flowers in a vase. Instead of painting on canvas or paper, the artist used a different approach: she painted on the back of a piece of glass. This method is called reverse glass painting. Rather than starting with the background, James first painted the fine details of the flowers, then the vase, and the background last. See how the petal of the white flower at the bottom right sits on top of the vase?