Sharon & Peterborough, NH -- Art classes of all types and for all ages are available at the Sharon Arts Center’s Winter Session, which will now be offered at their Downtown Gallery in Peterborough, located in Depot Square, as well as at their School of Arts & Craft, 457 Rt. 123, Sharon.

Winter Session classes begin the week of Jan. 16 and continue to open through the beginning of February. The classes run once a week for either 6 or 8 weeks and one-day workshops are available as well. New class sessions begin in March and April.

“Offering classes in our Peterborough Gallery is a new effort to provide an accessible and convenient arts experience for our community while at the same time introducing more people to the wider range of classes offered at our state-of-the-arts facility at Sharon,” says Executive Director Keri Wiederspahn.

Also new for the Winter Session, according to Wiederspahn, is online registration at www.sharonarts.org, where a full lineup of classes can be found.

Children as young as 2 1/2 can enjoy offerings in the Young Artist Foundation, where first-time artists just learning to express themselves with their creativity will be given the guidance needed to understand not only how to use certain techniques, tools, and mediums, but how to have fun while learning to observe and work from both life and imagination to create beautiful works of art.

In the Young Artist Foundation, there are “Mommy and Me” classes for ages 2 1/2 to 4 1/2 as well as “Just Me” classes for ages 4 to 5. Ages 5 to 8 can participate in a morning Youth Drawing Club, which is ideal for young children or homeschoolers who want an exploratory, project-driven class. For ages 6 and older, afterschool clay classes are being offered, as well as painting classes for ages 7 and older. A class in “Illustrating a Story” is offered for ages 8 to 12, along with “Paper-making and Papercrafts” for ages 8 and older and “The Young Pastel Artist” for age 10 and older.

Teenagers can join “Teen Torch,” to be held in 8-week afternoon sessions that will allow students to explore “melting madness” on the torch to create everything from beads and buttons to small vases and sculptures. Teens are also welcome to enter into adult classes that fit their schedule.

Classes and workshops for adults will be offered in morning, afternoon, and evening classes in painting and drawing, clay, mixed media and printmaking, fiber, glass, jewelry and metal, and photography and digital media.

“Our Winter adult classes include newer programs such as Encaustic Painting,” says School director Alexandra Wall, “and we’re happy to be expanding our youth programs. Available as well are our known favorites such as drawing, weaving, watercolor, Creating a Series with Mary Iselin, and a lineup of clay offerings that now entail advanced classes for the more practiced ceramic student.”

For more information and to register see www.sharonarts.org, email register@sharonarts.org, or call (603) 924-7256.

A free Open House at the School of Art & Craft in Sharon will be held on Saturday, Jan. 14 from 10 am to 3 pm. During the Open House interested students will have an opportunity to visit the School, learn about Sharon Arts, meet faculty and staff, and even try out a class. A full Open House schedule can be viewed on the website and registration sign-ups will be available.

The mission of Sharon Arts Center, a non-profit organization, is to engage the community in the artistic process, to support and serve artists and craftspeople, and to foster the relationship between artists and the community through education, exhibitions, and the promotion and sale of arts and crafts as well as through special programs and events.

Sharon Arts center offers a wide variety of art classes and programs in the school facility in Sharon, NH--a Fine Craft Gallery, a Juried Artist Member Gallery, and an Exhibition Gallery at Depot Square.

The Sharon Arts Fine Crafts Exhibition Gallery is accessed through Depot Square and 30 Grove St. in downtown Peterborough. The Craft Gallery is located in Depot Square in Downtown Peterborough. Store and Exhibition Gallery hours are: Monday - Saturday 10 am to 6 pm, Sunday 11 - 5 pm.

Sharon Arts is sponsored in part by: The New Hampshire State Council on the Arts, The National Endowment for the Arts through the American Recovery & Reinvestment Act, The Susan A. & Donald P. Babson Charitable Foundation, The Bean Foundation, The Max & Victoria Dreyfus Foundation, The Grimshaw-Gudewicz Charitable Foundation, The Putnam Foundation, The Kingsbury Foundation, and art lovers like you!

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