Workshops for Children

The Office of Educational Programs offers innovative and engaging workshops in which children and their families explore the collections and exhibitions at the Museum. Through in-gallery experiences and art projects, children learn about the arts and cultures of the world.

Sunday, January 29
2-4:30 pm, Tate Room
Classical Figure Drawing Workshop for Children

Drawing the human figure realistically has long been the benchmark of a master artist. For hundreds of years, artists looked to Greek and Roman sculpture to learn about proportion and musculature as they rendered the human form in drawings and paintings. After exploring ancient sculptures in the Greek and Roman galleries, Atlanta artist Devora Reiss will teach participants how to draw from clothed models in similar poses. Ages 10-14. Parents will drop their children off at 2 pm and pick them up at 4:30 pm. Fee: $12 for Carlos Museum members; $15 for non-members. Registration is required by calling 404.727.0519.


Sunday, February 26
Noon to 5 pm, Reception Hall
Urban Mandala

Kimberly Carmody from Urban River Arts in New York and museum volunteers will be on hand to help participants of all ages create a giant mandala from natural and recyclable materials. Visitors will help create the mandala design by using a large-scale compass, a string, and a piece of chalk. Then visitors will create the colors and textures of the mandala by filling the sections with found and repurposed materials. Once it is finished, participants will participate in a dismantling ceremony where they may take and reuse and recycle the materials. This event is co-sponsored by the Emory Office of Sustainability Initiatives.
Photo by Asa Williams.

If you would like to be on the email list to receive information about workshops or other programs for children please send an email to Nina West.

Children's Concerts

The Carlos Museum offers an exciting series of chamber music concerts for children and families performed by The Emory Chamber Music Society of Atlanta and special guest artists.  Family concerts are a wonderful way to introduce children of all ages to chamber music in the intimate space of the Carlos Museum's Reception Hall. Concerts last for approximately one hour. 

Family Concerts at the Carlos Museum are made possible through the generous financial support of the Christian Humann Foundation.

Sunday, January 22
4 pm, Reception Hall
Chinese New Year Family Concert

Celebrate the Year of the Dragon with the Vega String Quartet and performances on traditional Chinese instruments. Family concerts are free to Carlos Museum Family level members; all others $4 in advance at the Arts at Emory Box Office (404.727.5050) or at the door.


Friday, February 10
7:30 pm, Reception Hall
Pajama Concert

Children are invited to wear their pajamas and bring a pillow and/or stuffed animal and hear "a little night music!" Hot chocolate and marshmallows will be served on this cold winter night as children and families listen to music about nighttime and sleep by Mozart, Chopin, Beethoven, Bartok, and Schumann performed by the Vega String Quartet and William Ransom, piano. This event is free.

If you would like to be on the email list to receive information about Family Concerts or other programs for children please send an email to Nina West.

Artful Stories at the Museum

When ancient art, great stories, and inquisitive children are brought together something exciting happens and young imaginations flourish! Beginning this fall, the Carlos Museum will be offering a new program for children three to five years old accompanied by a parent or other adult. Once a month on select Saturdays, children will be able to sit in the galleries surrounded by works of art and hear stories of ancient Greece, Egypt, Asia, and the Americas read by Emory faculty and Museum curators and staff. After the story, children and their companions will move to the Tate Room to create works of art based on the story and the cultures represented in our collections.

Saturday, January 21
10 am, Ancient Americas Galleries
Artful Stories: The Chocolate Tree

When Kulkulkan, the Mayan king who is also a god, wants to give his people a chocolate tree and introduce them to the pleasures of chocolate, his brother, Night Jaguar, disagrees. Come hear this story from the Maya about how chocolate became a gift to all people. After the story we will take a look at several of the objects in the Ancient Americas that are mentioned in the story and make Mexican hot chocolate. For ages 3 to 5 years and accompanying adults. This program is free but a reservation is required by calling 404.727.0519.

Saturday, February 18
10 am, Level Three Galleries
Artful Stories: The Wisdom of the Crows and Other Buddhist Tales

Surrounded by the richly patterned and colorful mandala images from Tibetan Buddhism, children will hear two humorous and pithy stories from The Wisdom of the Crows and Other Buddhist Tales so simple that even young children will enjoy and understand their meaning. After looking more closely at mandalas, children will decorate a simple tea cup like one featured in one of the stories. For ages 3 to 5 years and accompanying adults. This program is free but a reservation is required by calling 404.727.0519.

If you would like to be on the email list to receive information about Artful Stories or other programs for children please send an email to Nina West.

Camp Carlos 2012

The Michael C. Carlos Museum celebrates 19 years of providing exceptional summer programs in which children and teenagers explore the human impulse to create works of art. Camp Carlos offers participants imaginative and innovative opportunities to explore the ways in which people throughout time and across cultures have created works of art. All sessions of camp include studio activities with some of Atlanta's best practicing visual and performing artists, and visits to the Carlos Museum galleries, where campers learn from artists of the ancient world.

Registration for Camp Carlos 2012 begins on Thursday, February 16, for Carlos Museum members and Emory faculty and staff, and on Thursday, February 23, for non-members.

To download the Camp Carlos 2012 brochure, please click here.

Figure It Out
Ceramics Studio
June 4-8 (7-9 years)
June 11-15 (10-12 years)
Making images of the human figure is as old as the impulse to make art. From abstract human figures in clay to the highly idealized images of people depicted in ancient Greece to the individualized portraits of Rome, the Carlos collections provide a rich visual resource for creating figures and faces. Under the tutelage of Atlanta ceramic artist Ana Vizurraga, campers will shape human figures in clay.

The Lost Hero
Creative Drama
June 18-22 (7-12 years)
Return to Rick Riordan’s world of Camp Half-Blood with Annabeth as well as new characters Jason, who suffers from amnesia; Piper, his girlfriend; and Leo, his best friend, whose parents are gods in their Roman rather than Greek form. These teen demigods have three days to rescue the goddess Hera before the giant Porphyrion destroys Zeus and overthrows the gods of Olympus. Through creative drama and improv techniques, Julia Prittie Kneeland, professional children’s drama teacher/director, will take campers on a quest to outwit Medea, King Midas, and the giant cannibal Enceladus. And no quest worth its salt can be undertaken without swords and shields campers will make during the week.

Son of Neptune
Creative Drama
June 25-29 (7-12 years)
Percy Jackson is back but he has amnesia and does not know why Gorgons are relentlessly pursuing him. No sooner has he escaped from this predicament than he meets a goddess in disguise who helps him get to Camp Jupiter, the camp for Roman demigods. In this session of camp based on Rick Riordan’s book The Son of Neptune, children’s drama teacher/director Julia Prittie Kneeland will use creative drama and improv techniques with campers as they help save Camp Jupiter and reunite the demigods, Roman and Greek. Along the way, campers will make Anaklusmos/Riptide, the fire of life, and other accoutrements useful for demigods.

Hot Glass
Glass Studio
July 9-13 and July 16-20 (13-17 years)
Glass has a history that reaches back to ancient Mesopotamia and developed fully as an art form during the ancient Roman Empire. Using techniques that have changed little since ancient times, glass artists from Janke Studio will teach teens how to work with hot glass to blow, slump, fuse, make beads, cast, and wrap to make works in glass in this special two week session. The first week of camp will take place at the Carlos Museum and will include exploring glass works of art in the Carlos collections and the second week of camp will be onsite at Janke Studios. Transportation to and from Janke Studios will be provided.

The Book of Ra and The Throne of Fire
July 23-27 (7-9 years)
July 30-August 3 (10-12 years)
Siblings Carter and Sadie, descendants of the House of Life, have to revive the sun god Ra in order to battle the forces of Chaos in the form of the Apophis snake in Rick Riordan’s The Throne of Fire, the second book in The Kane Chronicles. But first they must search the world for the three parts of The Book of Ra, a papyrus scroll with ancient Egyptian spells written in hieroglyphs. In this session, Atlanta artist Cathy Amos will use the traditional tools of ancient Egyptian scribes—reed pens, papyrus, and ink—
to teach campers the skills of ancient Egyptian scribes as they create a papyrus scroll containing the commands used by Carter and Sadie.

To download the Camp Carlos 2012 brochure, please click here.

If you would like to receive emails about Camp Carlos and other programs for children and families please contact Nina West.

Camp hours are Monday through Friday, 9 am to 3 pm. Aftercare is available from 3 to 5 pm. Camp sessions are $185 per week for Carlos Museum members; $225 per week for non-members. This year we are offering a 10% discount to families registering more than one child from the same family. Aftercare is available Monday through Friday from 3 to 5 pm for an additional $60. For more information please call 404.727.0519. 

Spring Break Art Week

Each year, during the Metro-area public school spring break, the Carlos Museum presents gallery tours, art activities, and performances for families.  In 2012, Spring Break Week activities will feature a new Family Guide to the Asian Galleries and art activities related to the exhibition Mandala:  Sacred Circle in Tibetan Art.  Check back for more information, coming soon.