Alexa Anderson
Title: The Wild Spirit at Upper Antelope Canyon
Image Description: Rose gold framed black and white photo titled The Wild Spirit at Upper Antelope Canyon. It is a photo of a rock formation in Arizona capturing many layers of light, shadow, depth, and angles. The viewer is swept up from the darkest shadow on the left to the brightest spot right of photo center, angled up in the sunlight from overhead. The decision to showcase this rock formation in black and white also emphasizes the unique abstract shapes and lines. The area highlighted in the direct sunlight even suggests the outline of a human face in profile.
Emma Andrechek
Title: Redwing Blackbird Resting
Image Description: Photo of a male Red-winged Blackbird resting on a cattail in front of a blurred pond.
Sophia Elrick
Title: Room for Growth
Image Description: White framed graphic image with a bright, earth green background and friendly animated, light brown tree stump with a half smile. The cheerful blue flower sprouting from the top is also the “o” in “growth” featured in the dark, lowercased text “There is always room for growth”. Background also includes colorful and playful array of shapes, such as swirls, stars and hearts.
Ariana Fobbs
Title: Neurodiversity
Image Description: Side profile of a woman’s face and wavy hair with talents, and disabilities written on different locks of hair. She is staring straight ahead at colorful shapes that are interlocked together like a chain. Which are supposed to represent an expression of creativity.
Etiennette Hebert
Untitled
Image Description: A collage of five photos of a sculpture made with dented Coke Zero cans. The title of the artwork is overlaid in a hard-to-read font. The sculpture has three legs converging into a cane-shaped body with several long and short cardboard cylinders jutting out along the top and back of the body. There is a spiraling tail, and web-like strings of hot glue drape out of the “mouth” of the sculpture while a Coke Zero can hangs, enveloped by the web. The largest photo, in the center of the collage, is of the sculpture standing in an empty parking lot, a tree with autumn leaves behind it. The four supporting photos are different angles of the sculpture positioned in the middle of the empty parking lot.
Cal Kahn
Title: Unmasked
Image Description: A pencil sketch of a person’s face turning toward the viewer. Half of the face is drawn in clarity, but it fades into crude jerking lines, the right eye just an oval with a tiny dot in the middle.
Hannah Kerchen
Title: Happiness Advertisement
Image Description: “An advertisement portraying a cocktail of nostalgia, childhood memories, and the longing for happiness. Featuring a typical, happy suburban family and a $19.99 price tag. Behind the piece: We all long for happiness and contentment in our lives. The need or want to escape the stresses and hardships of life is something that most people can relate to. I’ve encountered such challenges once I graduated high school, it was a time in which I felt lost and uncertain. Especially because I had a straight path that I followed up until that point; my whole purpose was to go to finish high school. So what happened after that? What was next? I created this piece in order to embody my mental health and I just want to say that, whatever you’re going through, there is absolutely no shame in reaching out for help. Who knows where I’d be today if I hadn’t.”
Jayden Means
Title: All Within
Image Description: A watercolor and hand drawn self portrait of a boy, named Jay Means, diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes, Depression, Anxiety, and ADHD, lightly smiling. Despite being in black and white, he is thinning about the colorful shapes, birds, and the world all around him, reminding himself that all the beauty is in himself too.
Caz Sivak-Schwennesen
Title: Something Missing (Memory Issues)
Image Description: An acrylic painting. The background is a night sky with a galaxy and large crescent moon. Below the sky are dark mountains. The midground is a forested mountain in the day with the peak covered in patchy snow. Below the mountain is a lake showing a sunrise yet still containing stars. A small red dragon is emerging from the water. The foreground is a bush and a cluster of pine trees. Throughout the painting are white areas, either with blurred boarders or sharp boarders. In the night sky section, these blend in with the stars.
Natalia Villegas
Title: Neruo Echoes
Image Description: Imagined in vibrant hues and intricate lines, Neuro Echos aims to capture the complexity of the human brain in abstract forms intertwined with delicate line work. Each stroke represents the intricate web of memories and actions that define our existence. Thin swirling patterns symbolize the dynamic nature of our thoughts, while subtle circles evoke the intricate ways the brain holds information. Through this composition, the artwork illustrates the profound connection between our memories and actions, highlighting the remarkable capacity of our brains to shape our experiences and perceptions of the world."
Sophia Nelson
Title: Autophobia
Image Description: Artist has shared piece titled Autophobia which is a canvas with oil paint depicting a face coming out of water. The image features a deep, inky waters depicted below a dark moody blue sky. In the center, a human face in profile is seen emerging from the water with nose pointed to the sky. The individual has dark hair which is mostly submerged in the water. The face pulls in the viewer’s gaze as a highlighted area contrasting with the dark colors. The eye visible is half open and suggests
Sophia Nelson
Title: Panic
Image Description: Artist has shared a piece, Panic which depicts a graphite drawing of a needle/light head with hands grabbing face. It is detailed and hand drawn, featuring a centered human figure contrasted against a dark background. The greyscale color lens offers the viewer a heightened perspective of shadow and highlights. The human’s bare arms are in direct view, raised with hands clutching the area of the individual’s head. Bare fingers are extended and tense. The area of the head is a luminous sphere emitting light and composed of matter that suggests electricity or nerves. The areas where the fingers meet the content suggest darkened indents in the matter itself. This goes beyond the familiar posture of one holding one’s head in one’s hands but actually having to grip into the inside of this matter to hold on. In addition to the anatomically balanced human hands, shoulders and arms, a browbone and eye can be seen in the depth of the sphere. The art invites the viewer into this person’s inner world and stress.
Sophia Nelson
Title: Silent Suffocation
Image Description: Artist has shared this piece titled Silent Suffocation which features an image composed in charcoal and graphite. The image depicts a face covered with sheet. It is a detailed and lifelike greyscale image featuring a fluid closeup of a feminine presenting face caught beneath a sheer fabric. As the viewer absorbs the contrasts of light and shadows, the darkest areas depicted are the closed and sunken beneath the brow bones, further emphasized by the perspective of the chin tilted up. The deceivingly simplistic details shown in the wrinkles of the sheer fabric mesmerizes and haunts the viewer, compelling a continued and closer look. The viewer is struck by the direct and centered upward position of the nose.The fabric’s wrinkles and movement are especially concentrated in this area, draping down to the lips which are less angled and partially open. The subtle, unsettled tension is heightened through the shadows and highlights contrasting the area of breath around the nose and mouth with the rest of the blurred facial features.
Riley Clark
Title: Still
Image Description: This painting consists of five panels: each consists of an image, a portion of the main poem in a red box, and scattered background poetry within the images. I will describe each panel in order with an image description and the corresponding boxed portion of the main poem. At the end of describing all five panels, I will include the background poetry that has been incorporated into the artwork.
- Image description- (In black and white) A birds eye view of an etched skeleton laying down on a simple bed while staring at the ceiling. Main poem- (In a red box) Time ticks beyond these walls, I’m sure
- Image description- (In black and white) The view expands to the entire room from the perspective of someone standing at the door, looking in. The room focuses on a large window with thick bars sitting horizontally in the glass. On the sides of the window are shelves of storage cubbies and positioned against the wall is a thin mattress resting on a solid rectangular platform. Main poem- (In a red box) But I can't see that from behindthe cages of windows
- (In black and white) The view shifts to someone standing in the middle of a hallway, looking down towards the end. A seemingly endless hallway with scattered doors on each side, presumably leading to rooms identical to the one just viewed. Main poem- (In a red box) Time is repeating itself Wall’s stretch blank and white There's frigid, empty air The light glare unrelenting This hallway never ends
- Now, there is a barred horizontal window in the center of an otherwise blank wall looking out at a partially colored field and sunset. Main poem- (In a red box) I want a place to go, something far from this Where there's room to run and sing and breathe
- (In full color) A skeleton is sitting upright on a bed that looks similar to the one seen in the first panel, looking forward along with an adjacent black cat. To the left of the room, there are shelves with various objects displayed including a rubber duck, pumpkins, a bird skull, MSU decorations, various pill bottles, and books. To the right of the room hangs two pride flags next to each other, one lesbian and the other nonbinary. The walls of the room are cyan, colorful Christmas lights strung up, and many colored stars are scattered around the room and ceiling.