“WHAT IF …?”
HOW THE FINE ARTS DEPARTMENT IS FINDING CREATIVE WAYS TO THRIVE DURING THE PANDEMIC
By James Venhaus, Director of Fine Arts
AS THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC STRETCHED INTO THE SPRING, the Fine Arts department continued to face enormous challenges. But, with each event or project, the choice was made to focus on what can be done, rather than what can’t. The most productive planning sessions always started with the question, ‘What if ...?’ These ‘What if?’ questions not only came from the teachers but from the students as well. In fact, some of the most innovative ideas came from students. We approached each challenge as an opportunity to put our heads together and come up with a creative solution. For example, when planning the Major Minors concert, we asked, “What if we used an FM
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Flint Hill School
transmitter to broadcast our concert to an audience listening in their car radios in the parking lot?” That led to our first drive-in “Car Concert” on April 15. Our theatre arts teachers asked, “What if students created their own theatrical experience at home?” That idea evolved into our fifth and sixth grade theatrical production of the poems of Shel Silverstein, with student-created costumes, props, and scenery, at home for a live virtual performance, on April 16. And Middle and Upper School musical theater students collaborated on an evening of songs from musicals that were filmed in homes, outdoors and in small physically-distant groups. Spring theater productions included a fourth grade live-streamed performance of scenes from
