The opening reception for the LAVC art student invitational exhibit presented student art in an elegant setting.
In the afternoon glow Valley students and faculty paced the art gallery, captivated by pieces of student work, hand-picked by their art professors. The showcase presented an array of different media and styles highlighting the effort students put into the academic year.
The reception drew roughly eighty attendees, who circled through viewing ceramics, painting, printmaking, sculpture, photography, and graphic design pieces. The sun-lit courtyard allowed attendees to sit, mingle, and chat in spacious surroundings.
“Everybody who teaches a class participated and they selected a work from their own classes. Ceramics, painting, and even a particular type of painting – there is acrylic painting, oil, etc.” said Art Gallery Director Jenene Nagy, who specializes in fine art painting and drawing. “The exhibition is nice because you can see the actual specific classes and the work product from those classes.”
The opening began with a speech by President Barry Gribbons expressing his admiration for all students selected to be a part of the invitational. He had the task of presenting the Presidents Choice awards and emphasized how difficult choosing just one artwork was, leading to the decision to include a runner-up, honorable mention award. When the exhibit concludes on May 31, the art gallery’s Instagram will announce an audience choice award, determined by tallying up attendees’ favorite pieces as noted during the event.
Makay Finley won the President’s Honorable Mention for his Art 707- Advanced Ceramics, called “Flavor Profile” – 12 stoneware clay mugs, in earthen browns, with a glaze finish, where faces are etched into the mugs. The carefully crafted faces worked into the clay were variously humorous, pensive, thoughtful, bemused, and soulful.
“I want it to be artful and have some personality and depth, but be something a person could use in their daily life. It is the longevity of the art form, the permanence of ceramics, that attracts me to that art medium,” said Makay Finley.
Lylllian Timothee won the President’s Choice award for her drawing “Sweeping Retrospective” in charcoal, for Art 202 – Drawing II. The class teaches technical, analytical, and observational techniques and tests conceptual skills. The drawing shows a young woman in collegiate dress, with
trees sprouting from her head, stone columns in the upper left, surrounded by endless text. She has fences in the reflection of her glasses.
“I have plenty of thoughts going on in my head and it is hard to pinpoint which ones to focus on, so where my hair would be, it is sprouting outward and the text is supposed to represent my thoughts spilling out,” said the computer science major. “I want it to represent the kind of chaos that goes through my mind on a daily basis because there are so many thoughts that I want to vocalize but cannot because of how overwhelmed and stimulated I am. Also, on my glasses, there is a kind of fencing, representing that I close myself off and hide that more chaotic part of myself – to maintain the front that I know what I am doing, and I’m fine.”
