“Celebrate Summer” — arts-X-press Presents Final Virtual Alumni Workshop
Published to the Pacific Symphony Blog (https://pacificsymphony.blog/2021/07/08/celebrate-summer-axphome-presents-final-alumni-workshop/)
AXP@Home closes out its online spring workshop series with a celebration of students and their artistic achievements during the pandemic
AXP@Home’s latest online spring workshop, “Celebrate Summer, Celebrate YOU!,” which took place last month, encouraged students to reflect on their collective accomplishment of overcoming adversity through the arts and looking toward the future with optimism.
After counselors led our students through fun summer-themed charades in breakout rooms, students practiced their storytelling skills through monologues—expressing the positive things they learned about themselves during this difficult period, as well as showing us the new passions they discovered and crafted while at home for much of the year.
Arts-X-press vocal music instructor Wendy Tobiska encouraged our group to hone in on their imaginative storytelling in the spirit of an acting audition: “As actors, we tell stories. When going to an audition—a celebration of yourself—a casting director may ask you to tell them a story; maybe a story about summer, or the time that you spent during the pandemic.”
Through their stories, students exchanged experiences, showcased their improvisational talents by creating unique characters, and inspired each other to comfortably voice their individuality. “Celebrating ourselves is important,” Wendy told students. “We all went through this big thing together, so what can we share with somebody else that we can take into the new normal?”
As we gradually return to face-to-face interactions in many areas of our lives, it remains important for young individuals to connect with one another through these spheres of artistic expression. Although many of these remote experiences have come to a close in exchange for their original, in-person counterparts, we must also reflect on the lessons learned and sacrifices made to ensure that artists of all ages could continue to flourish, and do our best to keep these values in our lives enduringly.
As this workshop concludes our AXP@Home workshop series, we want to thank our AXP staff, counselors, students and families for embarking on this new journey together and allowing us to expand arts-X-press into this amazing year-round virtual experience!
We hope to see all of you this July as we return to our traditional in-person summer camp for even more AXP magic!
Reminder: AXP@Home participants have priority registration for Pacific Symphony’s in-person arts-X-press summer program.
Student applications are being accepted on a rolling basis—visit our website to register at: http://www.pacificsymphony.org/artsXpress. Please stay tuned to @artsXpress on Instagram and Facebook for weekly content recaps and news updates!