Building Catapults and Crafting Family Memories

Parents, Kids Connect at Md. Outing

The workshop promised a Father's Day lesson fit for a Renaissance man -- a three-hour exploration of the intersection of abstract art and mechanical engineering.

But for the kids in attendance, it boiled down to a simple equation: catapults + paint = fun.

Yesterday, at a quiet sculpture garden and arts center at the southern tip of Calvert County, a few dozen families built catapults, then used them to fling paint at canvasses, creating paintings that were supposed to look something like Jackson Pollock masterpieces.

When the roughly four-foot-tall hurlers weren't up to snuff -- most of the catapults were so weak they had to be used at point-blank range -- the families resorted to other techniques. Such as flinging paint from a toilet brush. Or creating a bomb out of Alka-Seltzer, paint and an old plastic film canister.

"Now, don't do this to Mommy's mop at home," Claire Gardner of Callaway said as her 6-year-old son Michael stabbed a paint-soaked mop at his family's "masterpiece."

Calvert's Annmarie Garden is well-known for its diverse program schedule, and yesterday's event surely fit that moniker, said Stacey Ruff, the garden's director. Pitched as the "Father's Day Fling," the workshop provided dads and their families with pre-cut pieces of wood and instructions on how to build a catapult, then let them attack a blank canvas. The event was ostensibly to teach kids and their parents about Pollock, the influential American painter, but few seemed to absorb the lesson.

"Do you know who Jackson Pollock is?" Melissa Keesing, 42, of McLean, asked her daughter.

"No," responded 6-year-old Senna, smacking herself in the face with a paint-soaked feather duster.

"We just found random stuff and threw it at it," said her sister, 8-year-old Liana. "You know you're done when it just looks so weird you can't really find anything else."

Curt Mayes, 42, came to Calvert yesterday from Alexandria with his wife, Dionne, 40, and daughter Taylor, 9, as part of a surprise Father's Day excursion. A Pollock enthusiast, Mayes acknowledged his painting, composed mostly by him splattering paint with his fingers, was no masterpiece.

"This isn't Pollock," he said with a laugh. "This is just paint-throwing."

Some were more into the warfare aspect of the workshop than the art aspect. Eric Vogt, 37, of St. Mary's County joked that he might want to use the catapult to assault his neighbor's house. When his sons Dylan, 10, and Justin, 8, were not overly impressed with the weapon's firepower, Vogt wasn't disheartened.

"We'll mess with it later," he said with a wink.

For 9-year-old Devan Eilbert and 5-year-old Austin Eilbert, the hardest part of the project was choosing their catapult's name. Devan preferred simply "The Paint Monster," while Austin wanted something more intimidating, like "The Big Giant Paint Monster." They settled on "The Giant Paint Monster," bowing to Austin's argument that, "It's bigger than me, you know?"

Parents and their kids were allowed to keep their catapults and artwork, although it was unclear what the fate of each was when they got home. Many fathers said the paintings would be banished to garages or work rooms. Ron Keesing, 41, was more optimistic about the future of his daughter's painting.

"I just hope they used archival paper," he joked.