The creativity cup runneth over at Island high schools.
Regional honors for the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards were announced this week, with Vineyard students picking up awards in everything from painting to short fiction. A total of 18 regional high school students were recognized for their work, as were five students from the public charter school.
“We’re very excited here,” regional high school arts department chairman Chris Baer said Thursday. “It’s a nice spread of all the different media, all the different teachers.”
Four students — Sequoia Ahren, Kristine Hopkins, Gordon Moore, and Jack Yuen — earned gold keys, the highest honor. Charter school student Isabella Maidoff won a gold key for her short story titled Wyoming.
Their pieces will compete in the national Scholastic Art and Writing Awards, with results announced in mid March. Gordon Moore earned three honorable mentions in addition to his gold key, and Jack Yuen had three golds, one each in the digital art, painting and drawing and illustration categories.
Mr. Baer said that he could not remember if a student had ever won three gold keys before, but he was not surprised by Jack’s accomplishment.
“He’s an incredible artist, very versatile,” Mr. Baer said.
The versatility of the entire high school art department shone through as well. Students were also recognized for ceramics and photography. Senior Aaron Teves won two silver keys for architecture.
Two freshmen, Kanika Datta and Donald O’Shaughnessy, received silver keys for ceramics entries. Donald O’Shaughnessy’s simply titled Bottle belied the actual difficulty of making the sculpture.
“It’s a very sophisticated, well-made form that’s difficult to put together,” said ceramics instructor Brendan Coogan. “It just shows a level of sophistication and technical ability. He’s one of those kids that works really hard at it — as many hours a day as he can spend in there.”
Kanika Datta’s Uncertainty was a bit of a happy accident, Mr. Coogan said. She had created a stack of rectangular pieces, each of which was glazed individually before going in the kiln. The piece began to shift and to tip over once heated up, but the kiln began to cool before the rectangles could topple, freezing the piece in a dramatic suggestion of motion.
“We didn’t know how it was going to turn out,” the instructor said.
Students decide on their own what they will submit, although they get feedback from their peers and teachers beforehand.
“We’ll put pieces out, and sometimes as a group talk about the merits of individual pieces,” Mr. Coogan said. “Usually we find a consensus among the people that are submitting.”
Seniors are invited to submit portfolios of their work. Kristine Hopkins’s gold key was for a photography portfolio featuring seven diptychs of her grandmother with a granddaughter. The last photograph is an image of her grandmother on oxygen.
“It’s a powerful portrait of aging,” Mr. Baer said, noting the personal and emotional heft of the collection.
Sequoia Ahren’s gold key was also for a photograph, titled The Real House Wife of Brooklyn. Sequoia is a freshman.
Three students in the writing department submitted pieces, with all three picking up silver keys. Department chairman Dan Sharkovitz, who also teaches a creative writing elective, said the class had been focusing on short fiction last semester.
Junior Margaret Joba-Woodruff won a silver key for her fiction piece Oh, Canada, a stream-of-consciousness short story based on time she spent at a small school in Arlington. Margaret, who has taken Mr. Sharkovitz’s creative writing class for the past two years, said the story was about two months in the making. She has been writing since fifth grade.
Juniors Courtney Howell and Sonia McCarron also received silver keys for fiction pieces.
“I think it’s one thing for a teacher to say, oh, this is a wonderful story and so on, but for someone who doesn’t know you to objectively evaluate the work . . . not that teachers mean nothing, but I know it means a lot to them, gives them a little more confidence,” Mr. Sharkovitz said.
“The kids are working on things all year,” charter school art teacher Ken Vincent said. Many of his students’ pieces had involved lengthy time investments.
“Astrid Tilton and Anna Hill worked on theirs for weeks and weeks,” Mr. Vincent said. “They were larger, really involved drawings.” Astrid and Anna each received silver keys for their pieces, and Astrid also earned an honorable mention for her design entry. Austin McGowan received a design honorable mention as well, for an original skateboard design. Austin has been building a portfolio of skateboard design work for some time, Mr. Vincent said.
The contest is open to students in grades 7 to 12. One charter school eighth grader, Layla Buckley, earned a photography nod. But often the awards are chances for seniors to showcase their work before college.
“A lot of times it’s the ones who are going to art school, so that’s part of the reason they want to put themselves in,” Mr. Vincent said. “We have other kids who just do really great work throughout the year.”
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