Cultivating Creativity Through Community

New Joy Arts is launching a new a monthly gathering to explore the connecting power of creativity in community. Designed as a modern take on the intellectual & artistic salons of the past called:

Flourish Gatherings: A Creative Community Gathering for the Common Good

Join others for an evening of thoughtful discussion, encouraging community & creative discovery as we focus on ways to live meaningful lives of flourishing in our disconnected modern world.

Each month these creative salon gatherings will focus on a shared aspect of our daily experience with the aim to explore ways of engaging life with purpose and cultivating our connections to others.

This month’s focus is “Reclaim Your Calm” where we will be looking at how brain science, creative practice and community combine to help us connect in this current climate of disconnection & anxiety.

Thursday August 28th, 7-9pm in Roseville, CA

Registration includes small bites, beverages & materials for creating.

Cost is $28 per person or $46 for 2

‘Pay what you can’ scholarships are always available for every New Joy Arts program so don’t let cost keep you away!

Not local? We will be offering an online gathering soon!

Back-to-School & Back-to-Partnering!

This fall New Joy arts will continue to partner with Folsom’s Hope to offer weekly arts instruction for the student in the elementary after-school program geared towards helping students develop their social & emotional skills. This year we will also be adding a second day each week to create an arts program for the middle school program they are building.

New Pacific School in Roseville has requested that New Joy Arts return this school year to offer on campus classes for their TK-4th grade students & continue working with the 5-10th grade teachers to help them integrate the arts into their project based learning program.

Powerhouse Leadership College began a new class of interns this month for their 2 year residential program for older teens & young adults. New Joy Arts is continuing to collaborate with the staff to offer a weekly arts focused session for the current interns to develop a sense of their creative potential, internal self & relational engagement.

Upcoming Classes & Workshops

Current Class & Workshop Information

PARTNER WITH US!

There are many ways that you can help creativity flourish!

Take a class AND give to our scholarship fund to make it possible for anyone to say yes to creating! Just add a little extra to your registration anytime.

CLass Registration Page

Donate art & office supplies you no longer use! We often have items that we need to restock or are waiting on our wish list. You can check it out & purchase items for us!

Supplies Wishlist

Become a Patron of the Arts by committing to give regularly to help New Joy Arts cover the costs of programs. We are currently in search of 10 new monthly donors who can give $25, $50, $100 or more.

Donate

You can make creativity flourish!

August 25, 2025August 26, 2025

AngelaLeave a comment

Summer Spotlight

In June, I had the joy of sharing a week of art workshops with adults, youth & children with Restoration Ministries in São Paulo, Brazil followed by a week of Arts Camp with Oak Hills Church at The Studio in Folsom, CA.

Thanks to Patron’s support, our world is literally blooming with more creativity!

In Brazil, New Joy Arts hosted: 4 separate arts projects with over 60 kids (ages 3-12), 1 reflective drawing workshop for over 30 youth (ages 13-18) & 3 reflective drawing workshops for about 20 women (mostly mothers of the kids). All of the weeks workshops were focused on creating to discover & share what we treasure in life.

The materials used were purchased with donated funds & brought in suitcases from CA to give away to the participants in the favelas on the outskirts of São Paulo. Any supplies or unused materials were given to Restoration Ministries for the staff to use in their weekly programs in the favelas.

It was a full week of sharing & serving a wonderful organization dedicated to meeting their communities needs!

In California, New Joy Arts hosted 48 elementary students (entering grades K-5) for a week of storytelling through art making. Together we looked at illustrators who both create the art & the narrative of their books. It was a delight to invite the students to share their imaginative worlds with one another & see the sparks of ideas build fires of inspiration for creativity!

It is wonderful see how creativity connects us no matter where we are from or what our experiences in life have been. When people are invited to gather at the table to imagine & create, their unique voices & stories begin fill the space. What a gift it is for those stories to be heard, shared & valued at the table.

Through offering workshops like these, New Joy Arts has the honor of helping individuals & their communities discover the importance of using their creativity in living lives of deep connection & flourishing.

Want to support this work? New Joy arts is currently in search of 10 more monthly donors of $25 or more. Become a Patron & help creativity flourish!

Donate here

Want to cultivate your own creativity? Join us in The Studio!

Click on the flyers for more information or Register Here.

July 21, 2025July 21, 2025

AngelaLeave a comment

The Workshops

A Week of Workshops

The focus of the week’s workshop was to explore the power of creativity, through the arts in order to understand ourselves and our role in the world.

Painting – Called to create (invitation & opportunity)

Weaving – connecting to others (exploration & growth)

Creative Writing – using our voice (expressing our stories)

Angela Houk discussing the writing process with our featured local writer David

Drawing – observing the world around us (sight & understanding)

Dance & Music – responding & engaging in the world (posture & presence)

Community Project – cultivating creativity together (light & life)

November 4, 2019September 2, 2022

AngelaLeave a comment

Welcome to Klukwan

Nestled in the valley of the Chilkat Mountains, alongside the Chilkat River, lies the Tlingit village of Klukwan. This beautiful place is the home of the Chilkat Tlingit people and often referred to as the capital of Tlingit culture.

After generations of pressure to become westernized and forced abandonment their generational practices, there has been a revival of art, language & culture in this region. Their ancestors were known as expert weavers, wood carvers, line form painters, dancers, musicians and storytellers. In recent years, they have sought to understand & learn these art forms, preserve their heritage in order to pass them on to future generations. The Jilkaat Kwann Heritage Center in Klukwan plays a central role in this process.

Welcome to the Jilkaat Kwann Heritage Center!

The replica community house built for the heritage center & their culture camp program.

The Whale House Collection is one of the most highly acclaimed collections of Pacific Northwest Coast art in existence. The traditional art of woodcarving & form-line drawing are featured throughout the community and their collection of Chilkat blankets are the work of a new generation of master weavers sharing their craft. This week it will be my joy to learn, listen & observe this rich cultural resurrection as I have the honor to participate & encourage this growth.

The revival of Raven’s tail & Chilkat weaving techniques on display.

First, we begin with the very traditional art of berry picking in the mountains! Sourcing from nature is a primary means of provision in this alaskan community.

September 23, 2019September 30, 2019

AngelaLeave a comment

The Journey to Haines

On Thursday I took off from Sacramento on the first leg of my travels to the village of Klukwan, AK. I landed in Seattle amidst clouds & watched over my 3 hr layover as a rainstorm moved in. It was enjoyable to watch with my fellow passengers as we chatted together in our seats at the gate. Fortunately, it did not delay our flight to Juneau but it did make it difficult to see anything but clouds all the way there. We landed in the midst of rain and after retrieving my bags, I walked across the street to my warm dry hotel room. I was glad to sink into bed after a long day of travel.

That night as I attempted to sleep, the wind picked up and began pelting my window with rain. The sound was like someone throwing pebbles at the glass a handful at a time. This was not a great sign for the next day’s seaplane flight to Haines. This is was the view from my hotel room window the next morning…

After checking out off the hotel and heading across the street with my luggage I checked into my flight only to hear that all flights were currently on hold. For an hour we waited to hear if the weather would clear and allow us to fly but eventually all flights were grounded for the day. After rescheduling for the earliest available flight the next day, I left my bag of workshop materials with the airline and headed back out in the rain with my luggage to book another night at the hotel.

Once settled back in a room, I headed out into Juneau on foot to find something to eat. Thankfully there was a diner around the corner where I sat listening to the people & their stories swirl around me while I nursed my coffee over eggs & toast. I found a place to get some soup fo later and then returned to the hotel to spend the ‘bonus’ day reading & preparing for my workshops. It became a nice opportunity to pause.

The next day, I awoke to a grey but not windy or rainy day. I checked out at 6am to head across to the airport in hopes of getting any of the 3 earlier flights to Haines. There was a wedding that day in the village of Klukwan that I had been invited to attend. I did my best but due to all the cancelled flights the day before every seat was filled. My flight took off at 1pm with mix of sun and patches of blue sky and was worth the wait! What a beautiful view I had from the front of the plane!