Everyday Object to Quirky Character inspired by Thomas McIntyre.

Explore the absurd and the functional in Artist-in-Residence Thomas McIntyre’s work! Using the everyday object of a lamp as inspiration, create a colorful sculpture out of modeling clay, a wooden base, and battery-operated bulb. Add texture, details, and other embellishments to create a light-up character entirely your own. 

We provide the art materials and the inspiration, so you can share the fun and accomplishment of creating fine art projects together. Drop in any time, 9am - noon. FREE for families with children ages 3 to 12.

Led by Joslyn Villalpando

Mask-Making Extravaganza!

Hidden Shapes inspired by Maysey Craddock!

This Family Art Day is led by Door County art educator Katie Baeten.

Former PenArt Artist-in-Residence Zeja Z. Copes is a painter and fiction writer interested in bookmaking, traditional illustration, and the many ways to tell a scary story. Take a page out of her book and make a mini graphic novel to tell a story—scary or otherwise.

We provide the art materials and the inspiration, so you can share the fun and accomplishment of creating fine art projects together. Drop in any time, 9am - noon. FREE for families with children ages 3 to 17.

Former PenArt Artist-in-Residence Heather Nuber makes brightly colored jewelry and sculpture from unusual materials like paracord, rope, fabric, and found objects. See her work in the gallery for inspiration, then head to the classroom to make your own creation.

What’s in your kitchen? How about your garden? Discover the bold colors and shapes in Favianna Rodriguez’s food-based series, Favi’s Cocina, before making a kitchen collage of your own.

Ay-O, known as the “rainbow artist”, used rainbow stripes to outline or fill the subjects of his silkscreen prints. Create your own painting using all the colors of the rainbow.

Have you ever seen a color so bright it reflected onto adjacent surfaces? Adam Frezza and Terri Chiao made wall sculptures from colorful wooden slats that took advantage of this phenomenon. Slot together your own sculptures with colors that bounce off the wall.

Anila Quayyum Agha uses a single light bulb suspended in a pierced metal cube to fill a room with patterned shadows. Using cardstock, make a cut paper cube and light it with an LED – perfect for your bedroom or the tree!

It’s Tiny House Nation, elf edition—together, your family will build a pint-size cardboard gingerbread house that can be carried home on a paper plate.

Only for families with children ages 3- to 17-years-old. Adults wishing to come without the kids should participate in our Gingerbread Bash on Wednesday, November 8.

Get ready for Halloween—start with a molded paper mask and let your imagination fly. Drop in any time, 9am - noon. FREE for families with children ages 3- to 17-years-old.

Get inspiration from Carolyn Swiszcz’s mixed media collages of her neighborhood donut shop before building a picture of one of your favorite places in Door County. Use painted papers, wallpaper and fabric samples, custom cut stamps, and trace monotype techniques to depict a Door County icon.

Ink and watercolor and gouache—oh my! Play with puddles of watercolor and layer these transparent hues with opaque gouache in experimental abstractions inspired by the mixed media paintings in Just Add Water.

A leader in the pop art movement, Andy Warhol took iconic images from popular culture—products, newspaper photographs, celebrity headshots—and repeated them in vibrant colors using screenprinting. The most famous of these were his Campbell soup cans and images of Marilyn Monroe. This month, get creative with color and pull a print or four using one of our prepared screens.

José Guadalupe Posada was a Mexican artist who worked as an engraver, lithographer, and illustrator over 100 years ago. Since most people at the time couldn’t read, José needed to create illustrations that told a story without words. This month, we’ll try engraving, making drypoint prints inspired by José’s most famous figure, a skeleton in fancy dress known as La Catrina.

Inspired by Caledonia Curry’s public art project, The House Our Families Built, we’ll be building a “family room” in the gallery with area students. Add to this installation with a drawing or sculpture representing one of your family stories or traditions.

For his large-scale paintings, artist Sam Gilliam took his canvas off the stretchers, and sometimes even off the walls! Explore different techniques like staining and drybrush while painting on cloth like Sam. Then, drape your cloth over a dowel for display at home.

Draw inspiration from Monir Shahroudy Farmanfarmaian’s mirror mosaic sculptures, then make a many-faceted geometric sculpture of your own using mirrored cardstock.

It’s Tiny House Nation, elf edition—together, your family will build a pint-size cardboard gingerbread house that can be carried home on a paper plate.

Only for families with children ages 3- to 17-years-old. Adults wishing to come without the kids should participate in our Gingerbread Bash on Wednesday, November 16.

Get ready for Halloween—start with a molded paper mask and let your imagination fly. Drop in any time, 9am - noon. FREE for families with children ages 3- to 17-years-old.

See Brooke Brei’s colorful, layered creatures in the gallery, then head to the studio to design your own. Get your pieces cut on the glowforge, then paint and layer them to leave with a small sculpture toy.

Drop in any time, 9am - noon. FREE for families with children ages 3- to 17-years-old.

Work together to make whimsical plants inspired by the work of artist duo Chiaozza. Create colorful painted papers, then cut and exchange pieces to paste into vibrant vegetation from your imagination!

We provide the art materials and the inspiration, so you can share the fun and accomplishment of creating fine art projects together. Drop in any time, 9am - noon. FREE for families with children ages 3- to 17-years-old.

Eggs are featured in springtime celebrations around the world—from the egg standing game during the Li Chun festival in China, to colored eggs in the Nowruz celebration in Iran, to Easter eggs. This month we’ll take our inspiration from pysanky, Ukrainian Easter eggs dyed in stages using wax resist. Join us as we use paintable wax and watercolor on specially prepared plastic eggs to make permanent pysanky.

We provide the art materials and the inspiration, so you can share the fun and accomplishment of creating fine art projects together. Drop in any time, 9am - noon. FREE for families with children ages 3- to 17-years-old.

Step into the workshop of a mad mechanic bent on creation! Try out machines that shake, bob, spin, and expand to make unpredictable works of art. Create your own art making machine using a spool, clothespin, and rubber bands. . Drop in any time, 9am - noon. FREE for families with children ages 3- to 17-years-old.

Make an automata—a mechanical sculpture that comes to life with the turn of a crank! Choose from a few simple mechanisms to add motion to a sculpture made of cardboard, wood sticks, paper straws, and more. Drop in any time, 9am - noon. FREE for families with children ages 3- to 17-years-old.

Make a simple artist book with copies to share. Arrange words and images on a single-sheet template that folds into an 8 or 16-page book. Let us photocopy your original so you can give books to all your friends. Drop in any time, 9am - noon. FREE for families with children ages 3- to 17-years-old.

We provide the art materials and the inspiration, so you can share the fun and accomplishment of creating fine art projects together. Drop in any time, 9am - noon. FREE for families with children ages 3- to 17-years-old.

We provide the art materials and the inspiration, so you can share the fun and accomplishment of creating fine art projects together. Drop in any time, 9am - noon. FREE for families with children ages 3- to 17-years-old.