Words Colliding With Art, a six-session creative workshop designed for adults 55 and older that explores the dynamic relationship between poetry and visual art, will take place at Dog Ears Bookstore & Café, 688 Abbott Road, Buffalo. Sessions will be held at 11:30 a.m. on April 15, 22 and 29, May 6 and 27, and June 3. Each session will last from 90 minutes two two hours.
Gatherings will begin with a poem used as a shared reference point, serving not as an instruction manual but as a spark. Participants will respond by creating a visual artwork in various mediums, allowing language to move off the page and into form, color, texture and symbol. No prior experience in poetry or visual art is required; curiosity is the only prerequisite.
Following the creative portion of each workshop, participants will engage in a short guided discussion focused on process rather than product. Session criteria will encourage the use of symbolism drawn from the poem as it resonates personally with each participant, as well as the intentional connection of elements across different visual mediums. These discussions will offer participants a vocabulary for talking about their work and an opportunity to reflect on how meaning shifts when an idea moves from words to images — and back again.
The goal of the program is to reduce the fear often associated with making art, particularly later in life, and to expand participants’ confidence in their own creative instincts. By emphasizing exploration over outcome, the workshop affirms the deep individual reservoirs of experience, insight and imagination that participants already possess. This program fosters creative risk-taking in a supportive environment, reinforcing the idea that artistic expression is not a fixed talent but a lifelong, evolving practice — one that becomes richer, not riskier, with age.
For more information or to register, please stop by the bookstore or call (716) 823-2665.
