The Palo Alto Art Center hosted its annual Spring Family Day on Saturday. The event invited families and children to engage in hands-on projects that showcased the various art forms available at the center while also including a read-aloud segment and traditional folk dances from both Indian and Persian cultures. The day ended with performers from Xpressions leading a dance class.
To increase participation, the event was free. “[The event is] to bring a free event to Palo Alto, and to bring more people into the art center to get the flow for the first time,” Children’s Wing Department worker Jennifer Villegas said.
The event started with multiple creative activities, including paper flower and lantern making, egg carton flowers, sprout houses, and nature sun catchers. Each craft incorporated nature elements, from dried flowers in the sun catchers to seeds in the sprout houses. Meanwhile, teen volunteers at each station demonstrated how to construct the various crafts and helped confused families. “I think it’s a really cute way to spend an afternoon, just spending time with the kids in an activity that everybody likes is fun,” parent Stephanie Cho said.
The teen volunteers who helped at stations were from the Palo Alto Art Center Teen Leadership group. They mainly assist with ongoing events at the center, participate in art workshops, learn from artists, and help with events like these. “The experiences and the opportunities you get with the arts center are really extensive,” teen volunteer Lawrence Larasinghil said.
Following the activities, a read aloud of The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle took place outside the building for young children attending. After that, people were directed to the auditorium for the dance performances. Organized by Mosaic America, the performances highlighted different cultures and the connections between them. Kicking off the show was Xpressions, an Indian dance studio with an emphasis on fun and color. Dancers of all ages performed thorough routines in brightly colored clothes.
They were followed by Simorgh Dance Collective, a group of Persian dancers who celebrated the Silk Road and Persian New Year through their dancing. They danced with drums symbolizing the circle of life in Persian culture. At the end, Xpressions came back for a final performance, where they taught the audience a few moves, encouraging everyone to join them on the stage, where the dancers distributed colorful scarves.
“There’s not a lot of free opportunities for families, so I think it’s a nice way to get the community to come together in that way,” Villegas said. “It’s really important to have more spaces for people to kind of come and connect in ways that’s not going to break the bank.”
