AP Art Students Showcase Art in Gallery

By Lea Cohen

At NRHS, the art gallery is constantly transforming into a newly utilized space as artists work on new projects. Most recently, on February 7th, the AP Art students held a “halfway point” artists reception of the gallery showcasing their current work of the year up to around January. AP Art consists of three classes: 2D, 3D, and Drawing. Each class has a more specialized focus on certain methods regarding the art process, but all three options are very versatile in style, creativity and types of projects. AP 3D focuses on three-dimensional pieces–anything that can be seen differently from multiple angles as you walk around the piece. Creations often include fashion design, clay-making, glass, woodworking and any sculpture process in general. AP 2D concentrates its emphasis more on the design of the piece. Photography, graphic design, weaving, collage, painting, drawing and more in a two-dimensional form are all commonly used. Lastly, AP Drawing focuses largely on the act of mark making; students must place more emphasis on the visible brushstrokes, pencil lineage and composition of a piece as opposed to its design. Drawings are very commonly included, yet any media with the ability to establish mark making techniques is also used, such as paint, charcoal, pastel, mixed media, printmaking, etc. 

All three AP classes came together to put their pieces up through gallery installation. The installation was around a two-week process counting as a midterm exam grade for all AP students. Most students, as analogous with previous years, didn’t know the intricacies of how to remove and put up nails, paint large stands, or hang pieces from the ceiling. In a one-week workshop, the AP teachers went through each step of these processes with demonstrations explaining important skills that need to be utilized by any artist installing a gallery. Students then got to work hanging their pieces–hammering and drilling into the wall space. One meticulous part of the process was choosing which pieces to showcase, and further, which way to orient them on the wall-space provided. The way each piece is put up–even including small details–can have a huge impact on the way the audience views the work, as well as the work itself. The perspective the piece was drawn in could be viewed very differently based on where it is placed, as well as which pieces are placed next to each other based on criteria such as their mediums or other factors. Mr. Seaboldt, who just recently returned to the school in time to view the gallery show, said that the installation process “changes the work in a lot of ways…seeing all the works together changes how you see an individual work”. He also spoke on the importance of the installation process to the artists themselves, stating, “When you get a chance to install…you get a chance to get over yourself and your fears…and the artist learns. It's not about the viewer. Really, installation is as much for the artist as it is for the viewer.”

A huge portion of the AP Art curriculum revolves around the concept of a Sustained Investigation (SI). Throughout the entire year, the art students are tasked with slowly focusing on one centralized aspect of their art either conceptually or in terms of media, in which they explore that aspect further with each consecutive piece. Many students take a conceptual approach, focusing on a specific topic that has close relation to their lives and experiences, or a media-based approach by exploring unfamiliar media or one in specific. SIs must be developed intricately through the year, and were already well under development during the gallery show. Students have been working on getting to a more defined place with their SIs. When junior Angie Barajas was asked about her confidence with her current SI status, she said, “As of right now, I think I'm going in the right direction, but I still need to continue working and perfect certain aspects…I am on the right track.” However, many artists have had a somewhat difficult time getting to a place of confidence with their SI and its direction. Yet, disorganization isn’t always necessarily a bad trait for an artist. Quentin Bidwell, a senior, emphasized, “I feel like what’s important about being an artist is not knowing what I’m doing, because it makes me feel like I’m a lot more free formed with my art.” A second senior, Erik Rojas Funes, said, “I do [feel confident], but I also feel like I have to go back and tie up a few things…because I feel like I’m all over the place and I want to zone in on something more specific.” 

AP Art students all possess a hugely varying art process and conceptual path with their SI. Another junior, Lily Ferrante, described her process: “I take materials closest to aquatic animals…the consistency of clay is close to a whale’s blubber, and the crab’s hard shell inspired me to make it out of wood.” Erik also described his works mostly being about “suffering, so I tried to portray that in a surface level way so people could take the time to look at it and try to interpret it themselves, either positive or negative. The art is for them to see.” Quentin further explained, “My AP artworks are based on my own personal experiences with environments. You could look at the same scene–a cafe or a garden–but everyone focuses on different aspects of it. My first piece may be centered around what I would focus on, while the second piece may be what someone else might focus on. Same scenes tend to have completely different outputs.” Each artist has clearly been working to develop a unique, personal and interesting Sustained Investigation to center their pieces around, and has additionally been undertaking vastly different artistic processes.

The AP Art show is up in the House 4 gallery from January 22 to February 16. Each artist’s individual process, experimentation and conceptual development is displayed for the public to see, as well as for their own individual growth as artists.