Riaan Kaul, a 1st grade student, titled this artwork “The Future Jump.” “In this painting, I am jumping to the better future,” Kaul said.
Credit: Courtesy of Riaan Kaul
Dublin Arts Council is celebrating its 19th annual Emerging exhibition in a unique way.
The exhibit opened Jan. 12, and 225 pieces by 103 students from Dublin City Schools will be on display through Feb. 26 on Artsonia, a website hosting student art portfolios from around the world.
Emerging is an opportunity for children from kindergarten to 12th grade to have a professional art experience. Supervised by schoolteachers and DAC members, pieces of art were created over the past year for the virtual exhibition, David Guion, executive director of DAC and assistant professor in the Department of Arts Administration, Education and Policy, said.
A tradition since 2002, Guion said this year’s exhibition will be very different from their usual celebration.
“The parents and the grandparents usually come together, and the children are there with their artwork. Unfortunately, we can’t have that celebration with everybody joining in and congratulating students for their accomplishment,” Guion said.
Although DAC’s summer ARTcamps and workshops were canceled because of the COVID-19 pandemic, DAC recorded unusually high levels of participation for Emerging 2021, increasing from 150 works in 2020 to 225 in 2021.
“We had a lot more artworks than we could possibly hang in the gallery,” Guion said. “Artsonia was actually a great way to show all that work virtually.”
This drawing is soberly titled “Audrey”, a “true inspiration to us all,” Drab said.
Credit: Courtesy of Katherine Drab
Students found the pandemic actually brought about more opportunities for expressing their creativity.
“Because of the COVID, a lot of the things I normally do were canceled or lessened,” Katherine Drab, an 11th grade student at Bishop Watterson High School, said. “I had the time to enter this exhibition, which I would not have done otherwise. It was really a blessing in that way.”
Drab contributed to Emerging with three pencil portraits, drawing inspiration from the book “200 Women” and a school assignment to draw someone influential — she picked Audrey Hepburn.
Cecilia Martyna, a 10th grade student at Dublin Jerome High School, was inspired by the pandemic when she made her sidewalk chalk art. Two of her three works depict famous national characters wearing masks, namely Uncle Sam and Rosie the Riveter, which DAC picked up as part of its summer advertising.
“I thought it was a neat opportunity to advocate for wearing the mask during the pandemic and also make people smile in Dublin,” Martyna said.
Martyna twisted another American symbol in “Uncle Sam wants you to wear a mask”. Credit: Courtesy of Cecilia Martyna
Martyna said she has been making chalk art for the last couple of years as a way to express her creativity while engaging those around her.
“I particularly like the social aspect of it. While I’m making the chalk, people can see the process and enjoy it,“ Martyna said.
Oil pastel, 3D artwork and animation are among the different artistic mediums used in the exhibition. Guion said working with the children to produce the exhibition has been a joy.
“Children are pretty sophisticated in the way they see the world,” Guion said. “When they come to the gallery, they are very well behaved and very anxious to show people their work. It’s a really exciting time for them.”
Guion said inspiration from fairy tale and video game characters, still-life paintings and well-known pieces from artists such as Jean-Michel Basquiat and Pierre-Auguste Renoir testify to the creativity of these budding artists.
“It’s ‘the sky’s the limit’ with them,’” Guion said.
