Masterpieces In Motion: Coming Soon To A School Near You

Picasso People, an original arts education program in its ninth year running, is expanding its touring area into the Southeast United States. Picasso People brings the art of Picasso alive for students through mask, mime, and puppetry.

LANCASTER, NY (PRWEB) May 8, 2005 -- Picasso People, an original arts education program in its ninth year running, is expanding its touring area into the Southeast United States. The program, a brainchild of Artistic Director, Carlton Peter Van Pyrz, crosses the lines of the Arts with core curriculum subjects such as history, language arts, and social studies. Putting Picassos masterpieces into motion absorbs the audience in the creative process and thus provides a potent, multi-dimensional learning vehicle.

The program meets three of six National Curriculum Standards for Art Education, and thus fulfills the cultural enrichment goals of both educators and parents alike. Beginning this fall, the one-man show will be on tour in schools and museums from the Mid-Atlantic to the Florida coast.

Picasso People was like going to a kid friendly art museum. Mr. Van Pyrz enabled the students to better understand Picassos motivation for painting a certain way and enlightening the students to better understand abstract art," states Carol Wellein, Art and Social Studies Teacher, St. James Academy, Monkton, MD.

Picasso People is terrific because it makes art accessible and meaningful to children. ...through its life size images of Picasso masterpieces and sculptures, [Picasso People] helps children connect with the history, culture, music and language that enriched Picasso and fed his artistic genius," says Thomas Caravela, Northern York County School District, Dillsburg, PA.

Currently available to elementary and middle schools in New England and the Great Lakes region, strong positive response from art educators in more than a dozen states has prompted the company to offer the innovative production to thousands more students in Virginia, the Carolinas, Georgia and Florida. In addition to hundreds of schools, a good number of the most esteemed museums in the northeast have been host to the mobile production. These include Boston Museum of Fine Art, Detroit Institute of the Arts, and New Hampshires Currier Museum of Art. The creation of a satellite company will now open the market to southern museums.

Program creator, Van Pyrz -a professionally trained actor, dancer, and mime, has always been intrigued with the visual arts indeed with Picasso in particular. The early 1980s marked the beginning of his career as director of his own musical mime troupe. As the company evolved, Van Pyrz found a niche in art education. His easy way with children brought the art form of mime into hundreds of schools in his native state of New York. Later, he married his partner-in-mime, professionally trained ballet dancer, Deanna Marie DeMike. Together they breathed life into the idea of a dramatic presentation illustrating the life work of Pablo Picasso.

The result? A nationally acclaimed production that appeals to a young audience while satisfying school administrations academic, cultural, and budgetary goals.

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