Camp it Up!

Summer always brings excitement to the Dayton Art Institute, as we find ourselves welcoming students to the museum through our Summer Art Camps program. In the second year of its relaunch since the pandemic, the 2023 DAI Summer Art Camps took place from June to August for grades 1st–3rd, 4th–6th and 7th–9th. This year, nearly 200 campers took to the classrooms and galleries of the museum for multidisciplinary learning and artmaking. Held over five weeks, with a total of 15 themes such as Plants and Flowers and Drawing and Dragons, the Summer Art Camps program celebrated the efforts of the youngest makers within our Dayton community through our weekly art party held on Fridays of every camp. A special year to be sure, we even piloted an exciting program for our 7–9th grade camp called Teen Museum Guide. Promoting critical thinking, research and public speaking, this class helped participating students to take their viewpoints and interests, and researched works of art from the collection of the DAI, to create a presentation. At the end of the week, they presented this for family and friends in front of their selected works of art. The DAI Summer Art Camps offer such great opportunities for students from our Dayton community to stay engaged with academic subjects amongst their peers. While this year was a smashing success, we encourage you to keep an eye out for next year’s exciting offerings so that you might participate as well.