By Andi Bedsworth

Summer is the time for relaxing, traveling, spending more time with family and having a good time. For children, it is also a time to learn something new as many youngsters head off to summer camps offering learning in sports, music, art, science, crafts and much more. What about taking the time to do as the younger generation does and enroll in a class to learn something fun?

There are lots of options out there in town and in cities nearby. In town, the Oxford Park Commission provides classes for ages 40 and up in Leisure Lifestyles. These classes range from yoga, aquatics, bunco, dominos, pickle ball, aerobics, canasta, computer, line dancing, art and knitting and crocheting as well as others.

Most classes are free or charge a nominal fee. They also offer outdoor tours and hikes of various parks and lakes in nearby towns.

For more information go to their website at http://www.oxfordparkcommission.com. 

At the Powerhouse Community Arts Center, you can take a class in figure drawing. Constance Pierce, a skilled artist in her own right, will begin teaching a July course geared for a new and current participant in her Figure Sketching class.

This Introduction to Sketching the Human Form will help students explore charcoal, Prismacolor sticks and conte. Novices are welcome, and a live clothed model from the University Dance Company will be in class for live figure drawing practice. Prior participants in the class may explore an array of favorite mediums.

If you have not taken a class from Pierce, I cannot recommend her enough as a teacher. Her experience as an artist is extensive and so is her teaching resume. Anyone who has taken her class will tell you her classes are relaxing, fun and encouraging. She sees the artist in everyone, and is a true artist herself.

Pierce has twice exhibited her sketchbooks at the National Museum of Women in the Arts (DC) and taught with the Smithsonian Art Studio (DC), Cleveland Art Institute (OH), Penland School (NC) and was a tenured University professor of drawing and painting in New York state. She was also a visiting artist at Millsaps College and a Research Fellow at Yale University Divinity School (CT).

Her work can be seen locally at Oxford Treehouse Gallery and currently at the Powerhouse in their Bicentennial Show.

The class will be held on Mondays from 6:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. on July 10, 17, 24 and 30 and registration can be done online at http://humanfigure3.bpt.me/.

Also check out local galleries at the University Museum, and the University itself for course offerings for adults this summer. Many of them offer engaging programs geared just for adults.

So, get out there, check out the offerings, and learn something new this summer.

Andi Bedsworth is the owner of Art To Go, which brings free art opportunities to children in the community.