The 25th Annual Children’s Art Walk kicks off with their opening reception from 5 -8 p.m. on Friday, May 2, in downtown Bellingham.
The Children’s Art Walk is a two-week event in which 60 local businesses have partnered up with Allied Arts to display art from students around Whatcom County. The Art Walk celebrates the local youth and their creativity during Washington’s Art Education Month.
“It's a wonderful way to get families and kids downtown enjoying the arts and celebrating their kids' achievements. It's just so wonderful to watch the kids standing at the windows looking at their pieces and talking to their parents about it,” said Kelly Hart, Allied Arts’ executive director.
The Art Walk includes activities for kids and adults, music, puppet shows and performances by students and instructors.
Puppets by Columbia Elementary students at Allied Arts of Whatcom County on May 3, 2024, during Children's Art Walk, in Bellingham, Wash. This year's events include music, puppet shows and performances by students and instructors. // Photo courtesy of Kelly Hart
BellinghamART has participated in the Art Walk for the last couple of years. The Art Walk aligns with BellinghamART’s annual Art Show, where students submit artwork and host an open house to share their pieces with family and friends.
“If kids are on a sports team or something like that, there's games and ways to kind of showcase what they're doing, but with art, it's more of a quiet, solitary thing. And a lot of times you get kids who are more on the shy end or a little bit quieter. So, it's really cool to have a night where we can celebrate what they've been doing and their passion,” said Emily Zimmerman, BellinghamART’s owner and a teacher.
Not only does it empower kids to see their own art on public display, but seeing other kids' art shows them they are part of a larger artistic community, said Ashley Mask, an art and museum education professor at Western Washington University.
”They see this community cares about kids and respects their artistic work enough to display it. It's such a powerful positive message for young people to see it out there,” Mask said. “For other people walking around downtown during that time when all the artwork is up, it's such a joyful space to be in, to see all of that creativity.”
Currently, school districts with more than 200 enrolled students only require at least one visual art or one performing art class throughout the school year, according to the Washington State Legislature.
“Music already has a very strong footprint in many elementary schools for a variety of reasons. Most schools don't have an art teacher,” Mask said.
To combat the lack of art in education in schools, the Allied Arts Education Project, founded in 2002, has 16 teaching artists that go into schools and teach art classes. It is one of the biggest art education programs in the state, said Hart.
“Arts education provides a variety of different opportunities for kids, where so many of our kids know English as a second language or have learning disabilities,” Hart said . “It's a way for them to communicate other than the usual writing and communication opportunities that are usually traditional school classes. And it teaches them to be innovative. It teaches them to be creative. It helps them develop their own identity. ”
Children are making sense of the world in all sorts of ways, and art is a part of that, said Mask.
“They're mark-making with a stick in the sand. They're sculpting with mud and clay. It's a very natural thing for us to make. I think it's especially important right now that art be talked about, written about and centered because it's incredibly important in helping humanity make sense of things,” Mask said. “We as human beings are makers.”
The Art Walk is funded through Bellingham Public Schools, the Washington State Arts Commission, the National Endowment for the Arts and fundraising cards.
The fundraising cards are of pieces that were exhibited during the Art Walk. They are selected by Allied Arts’ VIP group. Each VIP member selects their favorite pieces and of those, three or four are selected to be reproduced as cards each year.
Not all of the cards are on display, but they are rotated and most of them are available on Allied Arts’ website.
The map of the Art Walk will be available on the Allied Arts website on and paper versions will be available at participating businesses.
Art on display at Allied Arts of Whatcom County on May 3, 2024, during Children's Art Walk, in Bellingham, Wash. The map for the Art Walk will be available on the Allied Arts website, and printed copies will be available at the participating businesses. // Photo courtesy of Kelly Hart
”One of my favorite times to go around and look at all the work is on Saturday morning, because there aren't the crowds, and you can just walk down the street and see it all,” Hart said.
Allied Arts is still accepting volunteers for the Art Walk. Western students can volunteer to help with the installation and takedown of the artworks. After the pieces are taken down, they are returned to the students who created them.
“I'm really grateful for Allied Arts for putting all this work into the arts in Bellingham in general. And then having a specific Art Walk for kids,” Zimmerman said. “It's really special and not a way that kids' art normally gets celebrated.”
Claire Mayne (she/her) is a city life reporter for The Front this quarter. She is a second-year at Western majoring in public relations and minoring in philosophy. When she’s not working on a story, she likes baking, listening to audiobooks and enjoying the outdoors with friends. You can reach her at clairemayne.thefront@gmail.com.
