FRIENDS OF THE BRENTWOOD ART CENTER

The purpose of BAC is to transform lives through the visual arts, to positively impact communities by presenting programs that build cultural awareness and empathy, and to support California's creative economy through the cultivation of creativity.
BAC offers fine arts classes for beginners through advanced students in the visual arts—including foundational, figurative, landscape, and abstract painting, watercolor, drawing, and pastel, we well as sculpture, ceramics, wheel pottery, cartooning, and mixed media—to students of all ages and abilities. Fine arts instruction is rooted in the elements of art, principles of design, art history, and the K-12 Visual and Performing Arts Content standards.
BAC is dedicated to an environment and curriculum that encourages self-expression, teaches traditional skills, reflects new and creative ideas, and is sensitive to the needs of the individual and to the dynamics of the group. Classes are small and individualized, and the optimum artistic development of each person is our ultimate goal. BAC’s instructors are talented artists and educators who have a desire to inspire each student while focusing on the integration of process and product, concept and skill, and creativity and structure.
BAC’s promotion of arts education for the community includes the presentation of free arts programs throughout the year, including a Veterans Art Program that offers four weekly classes at the Westwood and Long Beach VA; artist master classes on a range of topics and a variety of mediums; and workshops with visiting artists. Through a partnership with 18th Street Arts Center, BAC hosts visiting artists from around the world and organizes free community education programs to build cultural empathy and awareness.
To ensure equitable access to the arts, BAC provides more than $50,000 in financial aid to students each year. BAC currently employs nearly 40 contemporary artists from all over Los Angeles County as teaching artists.