STEVENS POINT, Wis. (WSAU) -- Not all summer camps involve tents, canoes, lakes, and campfires. Camp COFAC is a week-long summer camp at the UW Stevens Point campus for high school aged students interested in art and music. The College of Fine Arts and Communication staff instructs students with new techniques and materials they may not have experienced before.
One of the instructors is Mark Brueggeman, who says Camp COFAC is in it’s 9th year. Brueggeman says the students come from all over Wisconsin, and they have a few students from other states. “What we provide is a week-long intensive art experience for high school students. Right now, they’re in class nine-and-a-half hours a day, so it’s pretty intensive.”
The students get to work on music and art projects they might not otherwise see at the high school level. In the art division, Bruggeman says they started Monday with bronze casting after making molds, they’re now working on mixed-media painting. They will also experience shaping glass. “It’s all warm glass, working with fused and slumped glass producing tiles, bowls, etc. We have a very strong glass program here that has gotten more and more expansive each year.”
Past Camp COFAC participants like Ryan Weisenfeld are back to help the thirty-six students as camp counselors. “It’s a wonderful experience. The diversity is amazing, and getting to expose these children to college-level art experiences is awesome. You get to see them grow as artists as well as people interacting with each other.”
Students also practice 3-D sculpture. The music campers feature vocalists and instrumentalists playing everything from strings and woodwinds to brass and piano.
All of the activities are on the UWSP campus, mostly in the Noel Fine Arts Center. Students are staying in a dormitory all week.
Camp will end after a Saturday full of musical performances by soloists and ensembles and a gallery featuring the artwork created during the week.