College Art Day is an annual event held by the Fine Arts department. Each year the Fine Arts department invites neighboring high schools to come and experience what college art classes are like to find prospective students.
Diana Shaw has been the chairmen of the program for 12 years and commented that the event has grown over the past few years.
During the planning process Shaw will have the majority of all the planning done by November and will reach out to the other fine art facility to come participate in college art day. Each professor will then come up with a class and will present it to Diana Shaw.
This year’s classes were Drawing, Critiquing, Sculptor, Art History Collage, and Kumihmo (braiding).
An additional high school joins the program every year, which means that there will be less and less students able to go. It is up to the discretion of each of the high school art teachers to decide who will be able to go. Originally the high schools would bring over 30 kids, but as the program has grown, the they are only allowed to bring 15 students each. This year 116 high school kids attended.
Alongside letting each student come out and try some of fine art classes, the students will have the chance to showcase their work at the Fine Arts Gallery. This year were four different categories: painting/mixed media, drawing, printmaking/photography and 3-D.
Anna Bright was awarded Best of Show for “Dali.” First place for painting/mixed media was Alaina Miller for “Stress” followed by Anna Bright’s “The Blues” in second place and Mary Kate Alford in third place with “Shine.”
Alford also placed first with “Spirits’ Intertwined” in the drawing category. Avery Blanchard’s work “Emma Watson” came in second and Maddie Mitchell’s “Elephants” came in third.
For printmaking/photography, Haley Holbrook was awarded first for “Subdued Wave” followed by Madison Dellinger with her piece “Silence.” Brandon Butler finished in third with “Perfection and Beauty.”
In the 3-D category, Billy Bona was awarded first place for “Strawberry Cheesecake” and Mary Beth Gentry was awarded second for “Crocheted Bowl.” Jessie Tidwell placed third for “S.S. Tracy.”
