Senior Show Features Variety of Student Artwork
A variety of student artwork ranging from poster designs to ceramics to digital photographs are featured in the annual Senior Show at Alma College.
Four Alma College seniors are exhibiting works from their college careers in the Flora Kirsch Beck Gallery now through Saturday, April 24. Admission is free and open to the public. Gallery hours are 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Mondays through Fridays and 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturdays.
Adrian senior Tony Romano, a bachelor of fine arts candidate with an emphasis in graphic design, plans to pursue graphic design professionally. A graduate of Adrian High School, he is the son of Albert Romano.
Poster art, Tony Romano
"For the show I chose three of my posters from my internship with the Alma College Marketing and Communications Office,” says Romano. “One of them features an illustration I did of Miles Davis. I rarely get to mix media in my work here, which is always a unique opportunity.
"I also included a flyer I did for ‘The Fifth Quarter,’ a club in Ann Arbor. It's important to me because a lot of people have seen that flyer. There is a lot of satisfaction in knowing that it was out in the real world," says Romano.
Jackson, Wis., senior Maureen O'Connell, a BFA candidate studying Spanish, has a variety of media in the show. O'Connell studied in Spain and is a Fulbright finalist for her proposal to teach English in Colombia. A graduate of Nicolet High School, she is the daughter of Joseph and Patricia O’Connell.
"I explored a wide range of media: ceramics, photography, jewelry, graphic design and even furniture," says O'Connell. "One of my series includes scenes from my semester studying abroad in Spain. I printed pictures from my travels and drew on top of them. I didn't realize this before studying abroad, but journeying is an important theme in my work.”
Ada senior Mary Sugiyama, a BFA and K-12 Visual Arts Education certification candidate, plans to teach and continue her exploration in her own artwork while working toward her master of fine arts degree. A graduate of North Hills Classical Academy in Grand Rapids, she is the daughter of Dr. Paul and Debra Sugiyama of Ada.
"I really like to do figurative work, things involving people or life,” says Sugiyama. “This is something I do automatically. I am really interested in the body.”
One of her series, "Interacting with Birds," portrays many figures with small birds. Another piece, "The Gathering," includes hand sewn paper birds hung in a cloud above a ceramic figure.
"I constructed ‘The Gathering’ from paper I’ve had since I was a kid,” says Sugiyama. “One document is my acceptance letter into Alma. All this paper I transformed into a cloud of birds.”
Flint senior Ahna Danyluk is pursing a degree in art and business administration. She plans to pursue employment combing both her fields, ideally in a museum or gallery. A graduate of Swartz Creek High School, she is the daughter of Mary Jo Fletcher of Flint and John Danyluk of Fort Gratiot.
One of her pieces, "Discarded Time," is a metal clock constructed from scrap.
"The metal was thrown away, and I had an opportunity to make something,” says Danyluk. “It touched me that something discarded could be transformed into something beautiful.”
Another piece, "Give Me Gauges," is an oil painting of metal gauges. "I was drawn to them because they were old and not noticed," says Danyluk.
Another piece, “Painter’s Sink,” is a charcoal drawing of a flower resting in a glass cylinder.
Posted: Fri, April 2nd, 2010 at 11:39AM
