By CRISTINA JANNEY
Hays Post
The Hays Arts Council rounded out its series of art classes for children and adults last week and has already set a slate full of activities for fall.
One of the last classes offered this summer ran July 11-20. Youth participated in a stained glass course with the help of Mitch Sommers.
The students made small hot air balloons and birds using a Tiffany process, which includes soldering glass pieces together.
For all of the six students in the class, this was their first time making stained glass pieces.
The students learned how to cut and grind the glass as well as solder the pieces in place.
“I really like it. There is a lot more steps to it than I thought,” said Leo Hernandez, 12, Hays. “You have to cut the glass and clean it, then grind it, then clean it and then add the copper and then clean it and then solder it and polish it and then clean it some more.”
Sommers said the work is much like putting puzzle pieces together.
Stained glass is unique in its interaction with light.
“It lets light through, but it has its own shape and color,” he said. “It is like looking at a painting itself.”
Canon Meder, 11, said “My grandma said it would be a fun class. Most of the time I listen to her, because she says some things in life that are good.”
Avery Johnson, 11, wasn’t sure she would like the class, but took to her stain glass project.
Summer classes concluded July 27 with Art & Imagination, which explored drawing, collage, painting, printmaking and sculpture for children ages 5 to 12.
Brenda Meder, executive director of the Hays Arts Council, said she is currently working on a slate of activities for this fall.
The annual fall art walk is set for Friday, Aug. 25.
Sept. 25-29 Jay and Leslie Katie, an improv duo, will perform in Hays. The Katies perform a science assembly called “Juggling The Earth’s Resources.”
“We use juggling balls to illustrate how atoms combine to make molecules like H2O and CO2. We examine the carbon dioxide cycle and how the buildup of greenhouse gasses can cause global warming,” the couple said on their website.
Their presentation concludes with an introduction to recycling.
On Oct. 14, the arts council will celebrate its 50th anniversary with its annual meeting and a special screening of a Swedish film made about Hays in April 1976 called “A Quiet America.”
The arts council is hoping to have the narrative of the film translated into English.
The video takes the viewer inside a local wedding, into the old KAYS radio studio and into downtown churches. It also includes interviews with important Hays residents, such as Pete Felten.
“It is an incredible Valentine card to Hays in video,” Meder said.
On Friday, Nov. 17, the Dallas Theatre Company will perform “How I Became a Pirate.”
Meder said about 900 school-age children will see the performance.
On Dec. 1, The Hays Arts Council will host the Winter Art Walk.