Westside : Pupils ‘Pal’ Around in Art Program

Marie Hara wants to be an artist and she’s shooting for the stars.

“I’d like to have something hanging in a museum and be famous,” said the 8-year-old third-grader from the Granada Hills School as she gazed at a silk screen print on a wall at the Armand Hammer Museum in Westwood.

She and her classmates joined students from the Burton Street School in Panorama City, 70 youngsters in all, at the Hammer museum Tuesday as part of “Art Pals”--an art program coordinated and funded by the National Council of Jewish Women / Los Angeles. The program, in its second year, pairs third-grade classes from schools in low-income communities with those in affluent communities.

This week, the museum is hosting the more than 200 third-grade students in the program, who are from Van Nuys, Encino, Panorama City and Granada Hills.

“Art Pals” functions like a pen-pal program, except that, in this case, the messages students share are the pictures they create. The national council funds “Art Pals,” costing about $1,200 to pair two classrooms, and provides volunteers to teach a curriculum provided by the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art.

The youngsters meet at museum outings like the one in Westwood this week.