ADRIAN — For many artistic-minded young people in the Lenawee County area, the Adrian Center for the Arts’ Kids Club and Teen Club are ways to make connections with peers who share their interests.

“The goal really is to provide a space where kids can come together to build a community of likeminded kids and have a place to do their art,” ACA executive director Valerie Herr said.

The clubs draw students from all over the region. Some of the youngsters are homeschooled, making the groups a way that they might not have otherwise to make connections with other people their own age.

Kids Club is open to youngsters aged 6-11, while Teen Club is for students 12-17 years old. The fall editions of the groups met for eight weeks in October and November.

The sessions are led by Taina Mantey, a retired Britton Deerfield art teacher and now the ACA’s youth programming director.

“Taina taught art for 32 years,” Herr said. “She’s great at helping kids be confident. She’s able to meet each kid where they are and help them grow.”

Students explore a variety of artistic mediums during each session, with the students themselves deciding what they want to create based on suggestions from Mantey.

With this age group, Mantey said, her approach is always “You tell me what you want to do, and I’ll help you get there.”

During a recent session for which Mantey had suggested fantasy as the theme, one of the students, Gabrielle, was hard at work on a picture of a dinosaur — a deinocheirus, to be exact.

Dinosaurs in general have always been her thing, but this one in particular “has always been my favorite dinosaur,” she said before going on to list a whole range of facts about it. Not only does she just find it especially interesting, but “I like drawing dinosaurs that haven’t been done a lot.”

Gabrielle, a Teen Club newcomer this fall, has done art at home for a long time, but becoming part of an art program for the first time was a big step for her.

“My whole life, I’ve struggled to make friends,” she said. For that and other reasons, “I was really nervous when I got here the first day.”

But the teens in the club really form a bond, Mantey said. “They have a friendship that’s really cool. They start talking about all kinds of things that interest them. … And this is a really small, safe environment.”

Besides the social aspect, the creative process itself is important, she said.

“Lots of studies show that the process of making art, music, anything creative, raises endorphins and makes you feel more optimistic. I’ve had kids say [coming to the club] is the best thing about their day.”

Indeed, one of the Teen Club participants, Arabella, who was hard at work this particular evening creating a picture of a fantasy creature, said that the classes were “the best part of my week.”

“I like art and I like art people, and I like making art with people,” she said.

Students come into the groups with a wide range of interests. One young man in the fall Teen Club, Britt, is interested in digital art and so was creating his picture of a video-game character on a computer tablet rather than on paper. Britt said he started doing art a few years ago because of his interest in video games. He found that art helped him through a difficult time in his life.

“Art kind of helps me express myself,” he said. And while “I was awful when I started” doing art, he said, now his goal is to go to art school in Europe.

As class began to wrap up for the evening, Gabrielle stepped back and looked at her finished deinocheirus. “I’m sort of happy with it,” she said. Meanwhile, Arabella had completed the painstaking work she was doing on her painting’s intricate background, earning a “Yay!” from Britt.

Mantey said that both Kids Club and Teen Club help young people learn “to think independently and express themselves creatively.”

And you don’t have to have artistic talent, as such, to be an artist, she said. “Being a good artist means exercising your creative muscles, being playful, allowing yourself to make mistakes.”

Echoing that last point, a sign posted on the classroom wall reads: “We don’t make mistakes — just happy accidents.”

“Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes,” Mantey said. “Art is knowing which ones to keep.”

More information about the ACA’s Teen Club and Kids Club can be found at adriancenterforthearts.org, or on Facebook at facebook.com/AdrianCenterfortheArts. Scholarships are available.