Given Time, Student Artists Can Create Some Inspired Work

By Shannon Hicks

Newtown Middle School Art Enrichment students took a field trip to nowhere last week.

It was actually one of the shortest “field trips” sponsored by the school: The students walked from their Queen Street school to Lexington Gardens, on Church Hill Road, last Friday for the Second Annual Josh Day.

The trip was something dreamed up by one of last year’s AE students, who suggested to his teachers that they somehow finagle more time for the class to work on spontaneous drawings than the school’s regular 48-minute blocks of class time, and was named in his honor. Last year’s field trip really was a field trip to nowhere –– the students spent a day working within the school’s art department –– but this year the trip moved to a new location.

Twenty-six students spent the day working on drawings in the nursery area of Lexington Gardens on June 6. While some made themselves comfortable around tables and display areas near the center of the nursery, others were much more inconspicuous. It was hard to believe there were more than two dozen artists working; in fact, they were so quiet, out of the way, and completely happy to be given nearly unrestricted time to work on their art.

The students of Claudia Mitchell and Arlene Spoonfeather walked to the nursery shortly after arriving at school Friday morning and proceeded to spend all but the last hour or so of their school day at Lexington Gardens.

Once the creation time was over, teachers and students returned to NMS for open discussion and time to write journal entries. The art teachers encouraged their students to be honest about what they had gone into Josh Day expecting and what they got out of the generally unstructured time at Lexington Gardens.

The students worked on black and white drawings in the morning, and then switched to colored images for the afternoon. They were allowed to work, said Mrs Mitchell, “in anything but paint.” As a result there were pastels, oil crayon drawings, and colored pencil drawings created.

“It’s so affirming to them, as artists, to be given time to work like this,” Mrs Spoonfeather said Friday afternoon. “Something like this really allows them to work with sustained thought.”

The time allowed many of the students to work on more than one drawing. Olga Virgalla said she thought the day was going to be hard, “but I’m finding the drawings are coming easier as I start each new one.” By early Friday afternoon she had already finished sketches of a daisy, a cactus, and a rose, and was beginning work on an ivy plant.

Henry Erickson found the drawing part was easy for him, it was the selection that challenged him.

“The art is easy, it’s deciding what to draw that’s difficult,” he said, adding that he was happy with what he had produced and also thought the field trip offered “a good chance to see other people’s art as they’re working on it.”

Matt Biscoe said he had gone into the drawing session looking forward to the extra time he and his fellow artists were being given.

“I was thinking beforehand how it would be fun to do art without being pressured,” he said, adding, “this is totally different from being in class. There’s a lot more freedom.” By early afternoon Matt had finished a striking line drawing of purple New Guinea Impatiens as well as a pastel work that he was not too pleased with.

From the student journals came the following comments: “The atmosphere was serene and peaceful,” “Before Josh Day started, I thought it would be a typical day of drawing together. When we first got there, I was surprised at how much freedom we were given,” and “We are usually rushing to finish a project. I hope next year’s classes get to enjoy such a great experience as I did this year.”

Another artist had used his or her imagination to add to the day’s benefit, writing, “I felt all alone in a jungle of the most perfect plants… I knew this was going to be a phenomenal day. By lunchtime I felt as though I had just stepped through the doors and had all the time in the world.”

The resulting works from the Second Annual Josh Day are now on view at the middle school in the hallways opposite the C-wing office. They will be there until June 17, and the public is welcome to stop in to see what student artists are capable of when given free reign in a creative atmosphere.

“Everyone’s efforts and their resulting grades are all excellent,” Mrs Mitchell said this week, “and the exhibit we’ve put up … is a tribute to their efforts.”