About a month ago, when I was frantically working on two assignments, Row decided to take Justin and Ava to the Museum of Contemporary Art for a children's art event. The reasons were two-fold: Justin does love art and craft and Row thought it would be good for them to be exposed to cultural outings especially in the dead of winter when it's freezing, and possibly raining, outside. The theme for that event was 'Crazy Critters' and you had to walk through certain exhibits and look for animals in the artwork. Once you have found all the animals on the list, you go to an art and craft room and make something. The MCA provides all the materials and your child goes wild using his or her imagination. Justin chose to make an alien based on the three-eyed alien from Toy Story and a moon. He had so much fun and it lasts long enough so that they don't get bored.
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| Justin and his alien and moon |
These events are held once a month and it just so happened that there was another one this past Sunday. Seeing as I missed out on the previous event, we decided to go there for the afternoon. I must admit I was bit apprehensive as I am not keen on abstract or contemporary art but I was pleasantly surprised and quite enjoyed the exhibitions. The theme for this event was 'String Theory' and the exhibitions included different objects made out of string. One exhibition was pictures made out of all kinds of string made from different fabrics, another was bags made out of straw, another was desert weavers and another was dolls made out string. Justin had to look at the trees and the different patterns on them in the desert weavers exhibition and then draw his own pattern on a tree. Then he had to look at the photographs of the different bags to see what people carried inside them and then he had to pretend he was going on an adventure and to draw what he would take inside his bag. The last item to do was to look at the collection of dolls and find the three listed ones. The craft at the end was to design and make your own doll using newspaper. Other materials included ribbon, string, rope, bits and pieces of fabric material and pipe cleaners. Justin decided to make a boy basketball player doll as that is one of the dolls he had to find. Row helped make Ava a little Russian babushka doll.
It was a lovely family outing and also nice to be out in the city as we rarely go there. We started off with lunch at a pub filled it with a visit to the MCA and ended it off with coffee and milkshake at The Rocks Cafe.
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| Pictures made out of string |
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| Justin drawing a pattern on his tree |
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| Dolls exhibition |
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| Desert Weavers exhibition |
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| Justin drawing all the things he would pack in his bag |
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| Justin and Row making the dolls |
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| The end products |
