Third Saturday for Families: Ornate Frames

Third Saturday for Families: Ornate Frames is the next installment of the Utah Museum of Fine Arts' monthly family art day, and this one is all about the frames. It's held in the Emma Eccles Jones Education Center Classroom, and the whole thing is free—general admission to the museum is free every third Saturday of the month, too.

The starting point is the museum's European and American collection, where the paintings hang in frames almost as splendid as the works themselves. They're adorned with glittering flourishes, golden fruits, and intricate flowers, and the idea is to spend some time with them first. You wander through the galleries, take in the details, and gather ideas for constructing flashy frames of your own for the art you make at home. After that, you head back to the classroom to get to work.

It's part of a larger series that changes its focus every month, with each project drawn from the museum's collection. Past sessions have pulled from exhibitions like For the Future: 25 Years of Collecting at the UMFA, Black Refractions: Highlights from The Studio Museum in Harlem, and Beyond the Divide: Merchant, Artist, Samurai in Edo Japan. The activities are designed for all ages and abilities, so it works whether you're bringing a toddler or a teenager, though parents do need to stay with their children.

If you're planning to go, the session runs from 1 PM to 4 PM in the Emma Eccles Jones Education Center Classroom at the Utah Museum of Fine Arts in Salt Lake City. Admission is free.