Youth art%u23AFThe Annual Scholastic Art Awards provide a vehicle for exhibiting the best art from America's schools, selected from grades seven through twelve, while also acknowledging the educators and school districts who work extremely hard to keep all the arts alive for children and youth during this country's period of deep fiscal difficulty. Somehow these young artists cry to be seen, and have their artistic visions put on view. Since February 5, the Milwaukee Art Museum displays the 2011 exhibition of selected Wisconsin Scholastic artwork, over 300 total pieces, mounted in the Quadracci Pavilion addition that offers a glimpse to the gifts exemplified by these teens.
Every year in conjunction with the exhibition and awards, The Milwaukee Art Museum event honors a featured alumna who persevered to pursue a lifetime career involved in the arts after previously winning an award through a Scholastic exhibition sometime between grades seven to twelve. This year Sarah Mann, a metalsmith, was so honored. Her jewelry often appears in prestigious art fairs throughout the state and includes Milwaukee's Lakefront Festival of Arts and Madison's Art on the Square.
An elite list acknowledges past alumna: In 1987, Tom Uttech, currently on display at Tory Folliard Gallery, in his 8th solo exhibition 1990, John Wilde. 1999. Robert McCloskey. 2004, Patrick Farrell. 2008, JoAnna Poehlmann. 2009, Martha Glowicki, in the current Charles Allis 100 Year Exhibition. 2010, Nancy Ekholm Burkert and Kevin Henckes, two national award winning book illustrators and writers. The prestigious list bodes well for these current award winners.
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Anna Collins' bright colored mosaic work titled Pixelated Poppies won the Roland W. & Mary Ehlke Memorial Award while Sarah Nasgowitz's strapless dress and coordinated shoes titled Delicate Wings earned the Acorns to Oaks Award sponsored by Marc and Karen Flesch. The sponsors believed the garment fashioned in shaded light blues with loose threads similar to whisper thin vines recalled that (paraphrased), "Flowers and butterflies show human frailty hangs by a thread."
A Mary E. Kelly winner, Surreal Picnic, painted by Sarah Smiley depicted two curvaceous pears cuddling on a red and white checkerboard ground with a blue cloud sky hovering above them. Leo Purman's contemporary photograph Toshiba Joe, a man standing on the curves of a cement parking structure, gleaned one of five American Vision Awards Nominations. An award chosen by the over 20 regional judges, the final American Vision trophy winner will compete in the National Scholastic Competition held in New York City.
This is only a tiny sampling of the work at the Milwaukee Art Museum and on exhibition for only a short time, where every medium involving clay, drawing, fashion, jewelry, metal, mixed media, painting, photography and sculpture, finds representation by these promising artists. Appreciate the excellent work completed by these students, seriously contributing to the creative process, and especially the art educators who encourage them. In these turbulent state times, the exhibit demonstrates what educators accomplish for young people across the state. Applaud students and teachers working together before the exhibition closes on March 6th to celebrate youth art!
