Children ages 4 to 14 will be able to take advantage of Tarble Arts Center’s annual summer art classes throughout the month of June.

“The classes offer young students a unique opportunity to study art within a museum setting with small class sizes, highly qualified instructors and a well-equipped classroom,” said Kit Morice, curator of education for Tarble Art Center.

The classes focus on themes selected by the instructors and the Tarble staff.

“Activities are geared towards a particular age group bearing in mind what projects would be age appropriate,” Morice said.

The 4- and 5-year-old students explore art and nature. Six- to 8-year-olds focus on two- and three-dimensional art. The class for older students, 9 to 14 years old, focuses on painting.

The classes are unique not only because of their location and topics, but also because of the small number of students. Classes are limited to 12 per class to ensure plenty of one-on-one contact with the teacher, Morice said.

The teachers include Morice as well as area artists and recently graduated Eastern art education students.

“We have been offering classes pretty much since the center opened in 1982. We have received positive feedback from children, parents and teachers,” Morice said.

In addition to the children’s art classes in June, Tarble will host music recitals, exhibitions drawn from the center’s permanently collection of art, an art workshop for adults in August, an Elderhostel workshop July 27 and Eastern’s Summer Art School running July 10-16.

The Summer Art School is run through the School of Continuing Education in conjunction with Eastern’s Art Department. The classes will be housed at the Fine Arts Annex with campers staying at Eastern’s residence halls said Diane Highland, registration coordinator for the School of Continuing Education.

“There are four areas of concentration: papermaking, watercolor, drawing and sculpture,” Highland said.

The students will be taught by Dorothy Bennett, Victoria Bullard and Dennis Morris.

Bennett teaches at Jefferson Elementary School in Charleston as well as Eastern, Highland said. Bullard is a former Eastern student and has taught kindergarten through 12th grade. Morris is the artist-in-residence for the Illinois Arts Council and was named Illinois Art Educator of the Year.

“Right now we have 50 kids signed up,” Highland said. “All are from Illinois, but last year we had a girl from out of the country come to our camp. A woman from central Illinois heard about the camp and forwarded the information to her friend living overseas and her daughter attended the camp. It was pretty interesting.”