Whether you’re looking to try something new or preparing to dive deep into a process, here are six ways to explore your creative side this spring season — solo or in community, messy or refined, casual or committed.
There’s a certain kind of freedom in starting with the simplest of things — the feeling that you’re creating not for an audience but for yourself. It’s in that spirit that the Fresh Flower Workshop: Night Out with Mom at Boxcar Coffeeshop on May 10 invites you to play with fresh flowers. All the materials are provided; all you need is your curiosity. You’re not expected to make anything grand, just something real — a piece of art that has no other purpose than to be a thing you made. It’s small, it’s personal, and it’s about the act of making.
If you want to get a little deeper into your feelings, consider the Art Therapy Group by Cloverdale on April 25. Sometimes, making something — even something as simple as a sketch or a scribble — can help make sense of what’s going on inside. This session focusses on assertiveness and is an open invitation to explore the emotional side of your art, offering a safe space to create and reflect. Space is limited, so calling ahead is recommended, but if you’ve ever felt like your thoughts were too messy for words, this could be a chance to make sense of them with some art.
Maybe you’re someone who craves a bit more structure, or you want to experiment with something new. If that’s the case, Off the Clock Studio is offering several workshops that hit that sweet spot between free-for-all and guided experience. Their Art Journal Workshops offer a chance to sit down with an art journal, create with abandon, and explore what’s in your head and heart. You don’t need experience; you just need the space to try, to mess up, and to keep going.
For something more hands-on, pottery classes at Viva Clayworks are an opportunity to work with something tactile and grounding. There’s a rhythm to clay, a way it pulls you into the present moment. It doesn’t rush you. It doesn’t care if you’re perfect. It just asks that you show up and be present with your hands.
Perhaps you prefer to make things that are a little more permanent. The City of Edmonton’s Gelli Plate Monotype Workshop at the ArtsHub Ortona on May 20, invites you to explore printmaking in a hands-on way that’s both experimental and surprisingly accessible. It’s an opportunity to dip your toes into a new medium, to get your hands messy with ink and rollers, and to come away with something tangible, something that wasn’t there before.
If you’re craving something sculptural and grounding, the Portrait Drawing Course at the City Arts Centre might be the deeper dive you’ve been waiting for. Starting April 23, these classes invite you to slow down and study the human face — not just in form, but in expression, in subtlety, in shadow. It’s less about technical perfection and more about paying attention. Each week becomes a ritual of observation: the curve of a jawline, the slope of a brow, the way charcoal smudges when you’re too in the moment to notice.
