Why Art and Yoga?

 
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• Art builds children’s confidence by allowing them to express their feelings with out being judged.

• Yoga helps children feel calm and confident.   

• The guided meditation encourages listening skills.  

• Active listening enables children to imagine, thus paving the way for more creative art play.  

• Imagining the story shows one way that artists find their inspiration.  

• Yoga helps children tap into their emotional core, the mindspring of all creative art production.  

• Art enables children to think out side of the box thus providing an increased development of advanced problem solving skills.  

• Yoga provides children with a peaceful environment conducive to concentration.  

• Art develops children’s small motor skills.  

• Yoga postures and Yoga breathing produce left and right brain equanimity increasing both cognitive reasoning and creative development.  

• Yoga at the beginning of the art lesson gives the children a chance to move prior to the necessary sitting and concentration that art production requires.  

• Yoga practice will help develop children’s large motor skills and strength.  

• Producing art and practicing yoga can enable children to see how they can express the highest aspirations of the human spirit.  

• The disciplines of art and yoga extend far beyond the visual and the physical.  

• Yoga and Art help people of all ages to keep open minds, accept our cultural differences, and to meet the mental and physical challenges in their lives with purpose.

 
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KAREN LA DU

Karen La Du is a working artist with a BFA and a Masters Degree in Fine Arts Education, who has been teaching art for 16 years.

She is a certified NJ Teacher of both Art and French.  Her teaching experience includes 5 years as Teacher of Art and French at a Montessori school, director of numerous after-school programs and teacher workshops, designing the art curriculum and instructing at a private K-8 school in Monmouth County, NJ and executing a thriving private practice in her home studio in Ocean County, NJ.  In addition Karen La Du has recently written a book introducing modern art to children and their parents through a series of hands-on lessons incorporating famous works of art.  

Most recently La Du presented a hands-on workshop at the Art Educators of New Jersey Annual Conference which has been accepted for publication by SchoolArts Magazine.

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Prior to earning a MFA, Ed., La Du was a Visual Merchandising Director for various major retailers.
La Du's artwork is exhibited regularly and can be found in private collections throughout the U.S.  Karen La Du has been studying and practicing yoga for 39 years.  La Du is certified by the Yoga Alliance as a Teacher of  Yoga having studied with Lisa Campanelli Ph.D, HHCP, RYT of Blue Moon Yoga, Shrewsbury, NJ.  Karen has also studied with: Seane Corn, Sharon Gannon, Gurmukh Kaur Khalsa, Sally Kempton, and Christina Pao Cheng at the OMEGA Institute in Rhinebeck, New York.

Visit Karen' website.

CHRISTIAN VALERIANI

Christian Valeriani is a certified Yoga instructor, certified Yoga Ed teacher and has participated in various YogaKids workshops.  Following many successful years at work with two of Wall Street's high-profile invest firms, Valeriani changed focus when he committed to re-direct his energies towards the discipline of Yoga.

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Visit Christian's Website.

Karen La Du and her instructors have led Yoga: Art in Motion workshops for both students and teachers at the following facilities:
Monmouth Festival of the Arts, Tinton Falls, NJ,
Algonquin Arts, Manasquan, NJ,
The Rugby School, Wall Township, NJ,
Bay Head Yacht Club, Bay Head, NJ,
Pope John XXIII Regional Catholic School, Ocean Township, NJ.