Mia is Learning

 

When everything closed, a few months into 2020, Mia brought art into the open. From outdoor activities to at-home art kits to virtual Family Days, the museum continued to meet people where they were, wherever that happened to be.

With summer camps cancelled, Mia educators and teaching artists designed a series of engaging kits featuring art supplies, activities, and online instruction. Ultimately, the kits increased access to the camps, with families joining from outside the Twin Cities.

A family in Rochester noted the many high-risk factors in their family, along with their modest means, in praising the program: “Art should be available for all regardless of income or health.”

Art in the Park, which safely carried on with social distancing in the outdoors, brought Mia’s Artists in Residence to five parks in the heart of Minneapolis—Powderhorn, Farview, Phillips, Beltrami, and Whittier—for artmaking on the spot. Mobile Mia artists bicycled to the parks on a pop-up chalk tour, giving out chalk for people to express themselves in the moment or at home. In a summer of unrest, collective creativity enabled collective healing.

When Family Day went virtual as well, it opened possibilities for artists to try new things. Illustrator Roshan Ganu, for example, made animated videos featuring artworks from Mia’s collection and
kids’ submissions to the “Foot in the Door” exhibition. “Every collaborator has been ingenious in finding a way to continue sharing what they love to do,” says Mia’s Natalia Choi in Learning Innovation. “No surprise, artists are incredibly gifted at finding creative solutions to our many challenges
and constraints.”