With young artists recognized from Clifton, Cranfills Gap & Hamilton, the Bosque Arts Center 20th Annual High School Art Show opens March 6; homeschooler Rebekah Tyler wins Best in Show
CLIFTON – Expressing your creativity is beneficial in more ways than one. It can facilitate self-discovery, enhance well-being, empower and offer emotional release, which is especially beneficial for youth. The arts – music, dance, theater, visual arts, literature, film – as such can lessen anxiety and feelings of depression.
Unfortunately, present public school funding often forces schools to make choices between core subjects like English Language Arts and Math and elective courses like art and music. It was therefore encouraging to see students from area schools with art courses and homeschooled youth entering the Bosque Arts Center High School Art Show.
With five of the entering artists present, together with their family, friends and Art Council members, the BAC Art Council’s 20th Annual High School Student Art Show opened Sat. March 4 with a pineapple punch and cookies reception and awards. This year, the art show featured 44 works with great variety of 18 young artists from Clifton, Cranfills Gap and Hamilton high schools along with home schoolers.
While three of her four entered pieces were in the oil/acrylic category, her drawing “Pastor Levi” earned homeschooled junior Rebekah Tyler First Place in the largest category pencil/ink/charcoal. Many of the visitors present at the reception marveled at the skill and mastery the young artist portrayed with this portrait. Not surprisingly, Judge Cory Lind awarded the excellent portrait Best in Show. Tyler also won second place in oil/acrylic with her “Bosque Longhorn.” With those wins, Tyler took home $675.
“This is an outstanding piece – a portrait as a portrait should be,” Lind said about his Best in Show choice. “You can see the subject’s character, through the lines on his face and the twinkle in his eye. This one jumps off the sheet.”
Other winners in the pencil/ink/charcoal category came from Hamilton HS – sophomore Baior Morgan placed second with her “Ballad of Jane Doe," and junior Madison Henkes placed third with her late 1960s, early-1970s-vibe “Castle 2.0.”
Cranfills Gap HS freshman Vanessa Berumen took first place in oil/acrylic for her piece “Set Free,” a heart, complete with all the vein and artery details with white wings against a dark and gold background.
“This was a lovely mix of abstract and realistic art,” Lind said. “It instantly gave me the message of a heart being set free, expressing a change.”
Berumen garnered second place in the watercolor/tempera category for her orange and pink koi fish against a seafoam-green background in “China’s Nature.”
Third place went to Clifton HS sophomore Camy Barsh for her colorful work “When Life Gives You Lemons.”
In the Watercolor/Tempera category, Hamilton HS Junior Grace Carson won first place with her eye-catching “Flow in Blue,” blue jellyfish against a black background, which is not a common background color in the category.
“This piece instantly caught my eye, the richness of color,” Lind said. “And the interesting black background gives it a lot of oomph.”
Clifton HS freshman Johanna Freiss placed third in the Watercolor/Tempera category an untitled piece. It too was a water scene, with orange and red jellyfish. Mixed Media and Pastel did not produce prizewinners this year.
In his introduction, Lind commended the BAC Art Council for supplying this wonderful platform for youth to show their art, and the artists for “putting a slice of themselves on the wall.” The creation of the art work helps them learn to express themselves, and entering a competition puts their work in perspective with other works from other artists.
Lind pressed the youth to keep working on their art, to explore their own boundaries and push their limits. Always pushing himself on many levels, Lind works in all different media, from miniatures to murals, from abstract to realistic. Moving from New Zealand to Central Texas in 2019 and marrying in the process gave Lind a fresh perspective on his world. He likes to have different project working at the same time, because when he moves away from one project, he comes back to it with fresh eyes, which helps in the creative process.
Lind’s work qualified twice for Bosque Art Center Art Classic – one piece in 2021 which sold, and two of four accepted pieces sold in 2022. He furthermore stressed to family members and friends to keep supporting and encouraging them in this creative outlet.
In that vein, BAC Art Council Student Art Show Coordinator John Linn encouraged the students to apply for the BAC Art Council $1,000 scholarships. Call the BAC at 254-675-3724 for information and application forms. View the student artwork through March 17 during regular BAC hours Monday-Friday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Photos by SIMONE WICHERS-VOSS
©2023 Southern Cross Creative, LLP. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
