Spend the summer with your arts
Illustration by Josh Harding |
By Kirstie Hettinga
The Collegian
THE SUMMER ARTS program at Fresno State isn’t about what students accomplish — it is about how the students accomplish what they do and who they meet along the way.
Vanessa Pereda, a senior, participated in Summer Arts two years ago. Pereda, a theatre arts major who has appeared in University Theatre productions such as “Into the Woods” and “Rumors,” enrolled in the Jerry Mitchell Musical Theatre intensive.
In the intensive Pereda and others practiced professional auditioning habits and sample choreography. Pereda said what she learned the most was professionalism.
“Go in with a positive attitude,” she said.
Pereda also learned it is the connections students make through Summer Arts that are the most beneficial.
Through her work with Mitchell, Pereda landed a private audition with Jack O’Brien, the director of Broadway’s “Hairspray.” She continues to audition for Broadway shows today, and she credits what she learned from Summer Arts as a factor in the opportunities she has gained.
“You never know what can come from taking a Summer Arts class,” Pereda said.
SUMMER ARTS BEGAN more than 20 years ago as a dance festival.
“There was obviously a need and a hunger for the arts,” said Jacqueline Doumanian, a community relations specialist for the CSU Summer Arts Program.
Summer Arts begins in July and consists of two two-week intensives, in which students are in class seven days a week, for as many as 14 hours a day.
“The primary purpose is that it is classes for students, students have an opportunity to work with master teachers in their area and be exposed to guest artists, people who have been successful in their art,” Doumanian said.
Doumanian said for many artists who have taken a Summer Arts class it is a pivotal point in their lives that takes them leaps beyond where they were.
This year’s Summer Arts program will offer 17 master classes and 41 public events. The program is for high school graduates, college students, professionals and serious amateurs, but Doumanian cautioned that the intensity of the program might not be right for everyone.
Doumanian said the program is for “people who are serious about their craft and want to enhance their abilities.”
BEYOND VISUAL AND performing arts, this summer a course called “Opening Doors” will be offered that will teach how an artist in any of the art forms can find work in California schools.
Summer Arts has been housed at Fresno State since 1999 and will be held here through at least 2010, which will be the longest Summer Arts has remained on any one campus, Doumanian said.
Campuses throughout the CSU System have to bid on whether or not they want Summer Arts to be held at their school. “Fresno was a really good fit and the community was a more enthusiastic community than they had ever been in,” Doumanian said.
Summer Arts is funded by the California Lottery System. Doumanian said the contract between the Lottery System and the state requires that some of the funding of the Lottery go to education.
However, because the amount of funding has not been changed since the inception of Summer Arts, Doumanian said the program is less flush than it has been in past years. To ensure that students are still the ones benefiting from what the program has to offer, all proceeds from public events goes to a scholarship fund.
Doumanian estimated that 80 percent of students who attend Summer Arts are on some kind of scholarship.
Tuition is a single fee and students may attend one two-week intensive or two two-week intensives for the same price and for each session will earn students three units. The variable that comes in, is housing and board. On-campus living is offered, but Doumanian recommends students who live near by commute, to save money.
THIS YEAR THE Summer Arts program is offering a special course, “Drawing and painting in Florence,” which begins earlier than the other sessions. A one-time fee will cover students enrollment, travel, housing and class supplies.
As learning artists, students may not have access to all the supplies and materials that will make their work stand out. Joseph Hollak, a senior, participated a photo editing class last summer. At the end of the session West Coast Imaging brought in large format color printers and each student was allowed to print one or two of the images they had worked on.
One of Hollak’s photos was selected by the people at West Coast Imaging to be printed and professionally framed. It now hangs in the offices of Charles Reed, Chancellor of the CSU System and will be returned to Hollak after one year of being on display.
Hollak said Summer Arts is about opportunities, his class was able to take a tour of the Underground Gardens in Fresno and was given the rare chance to take pictures, with special permission.
Hollak said he intends to take another class this summer. “It’s a whole new world that this opened up,” he said.
Doumanian agreed.
She said looking at students involved in Summer Arts is amazing.
“It’s like they’re all lit up, like someone turned on the switch,” she said.
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