COLUMBUS — Though she has only been in the position for about a month, Columbus Arts Council’s new executive director Jan Miller is already planning new programs, particularly for children.
Starting in October, Miller wants to open the Rosenzweig Arts Council to children for art classes every other Saturday through December. Miller said those classes are still in the planning stages, but parents can begin signing up their children on the CAC website later this month.
“When you get into school, the first thing they cut are the art classes,” Miller told members of the Columbus Exchange Club at their weekly luncheon Thursday. “They think they can do without it. We’re really looking at how we can help provides those arts for those students on the weekends.”
In March 2020, Miller said, she also hopes to host a children’s art show for two weeks. She has already met with local elementary teachers to come up with a plan to show more than 80 art pieces created by third, fourth and fifth grade students in public and private schools in Lowndes County. The program is open to all students in those grades, and each school will choose the top eight art pieces and submit them to the CAC for a formal gallery and art reception.
“We’ll do the reception for them, but they’ll learn how to act at a reception,” Miller said. “They learn how to stand by their art and explain their art. So we’re going to teach them a little bit about what it takes to put on an art show.
“The teachers are ecstatic,” she added. “They can’t wait.”
Miller said she also hopes to host a “Waffle Fest” for children following downtown Columbus’ annual “Wassail Fest,” where visitors to downtown go from business to business tasting homemade wassail and voting for their favorite. That plan is still in the works, Miller said.
“I’m hoping that we can find an organization that might want to help us with that and just provide art for the kids and waffles, and sell tickets to that to help fund that program,” she said.
Many of the other programs Miller referenced in her presentation to Exchange Club were children’s arts programs, such as the Young People’s Artist Series, which holds art galleries for free to underprivileged children from around the state.
“It’s solely funded by sponsorships,” said Miller, who added most of the programs CAC puts on are possible because of fundraising and help from individuals and businesses in the community.
She encouraged anyone who wanted to donate to visit the CAC’s website at www.columbusarts.org, where they could find different ways to get involved and especially to donate.
Miller also got choked up toward the beginning of her presentation speaking about CAC program coordinator and interim director, Beverly Norris, who passed away on Aug. 16. Apart from being a friend to Miller, Norris was the person who kept the arts council going for many years, Miller said.
“I never got to speak to her about my job before she passed away, and that was really tough,” said Miller, who was director only two weeks before Norris died. “If you knew Beverly, everything was in her head, and she knew everybody, everything and she never had a harsh word to say about anything. I’m not following in her footsteps. … She was interim director for a year, and she really held the organization together, and we could not do what we do without her.”
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