Jupiter High School art program partners with Norton Museum of Art

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Christina Paraschiv

Some of the JHS students’ work at the Norton Museum.

Five Jupiter High students were selected to showcase their artwork in the Norton Museum of Art in collaboration with the Georgia O’Keeffe exhibition. 

The exhibition, Living Modern, used O’Keeffe as inspiration to examine how clothing and accessories are tied to identity. The opening reception was held on Dec. 13 during the “Art After Dark” event and will be running until March 30, 2020. 

The artwork chosen includes work from Carly Green (11), Jennie Hernandez Saenz (11), Noah Mildner (11), Elie Mariz Coleman (12) and Fabian Efrain Giovanni Alvarez (12). Art teachers Stephen Germana and Sarah Knudtson gave their classes a project to complete for both a grade and possible submission to the Norton. The five students chosen have used creative artistic skills through their ideas in the area of fashion. 

“I’m grateful that the museum had reached out to JHS to get some to incorporate themselves into the museum,” Hernandez said. 

Jupiter High has a large Art program, with students taking visual art classes like drawing, ceramics or digital media. Students in these classes have the opportunity to explore new innovative artistic techniques. Hernandez’s art piece is a photograph of her in a ballgown titled “Quinceanera.” 

“I feel like culture is overseen by a lot of people, and people don’t really recognize it as much,” Hernandez said.

Junior Noah Mildner’s cyanotype jeans displayed at the Norton Museum.

Mildner took a physical route to the assignment, rather than a photograph; his artwork is cyanotype on painter’s pants. Mildner created his piece by soaking white pants in a chemical mixture. Printing out pictures of his facial features onto clear paper, he then let the sun’s rays shine through and transfer his features onto the pants. The process took three days.

“I like taking things very literally and seeing where that goes, so I think mixing that with the cyanotypes photography and also being someone that’s very into clothing, just seemed like a natural fit,” Mildner said.

Mildner got the inspiration for his project from a previous Norton exhibit “Out of the Box”of cyanotype photography. 

“Our end involved a review of the work and the statements the students wrote explaining their motivations for the project,” Knudtson said. “The students I chose made interesting choices reacting to the concepts of fashion.”

Jupiter High encourages creativity and diversity through different forms of art; and in this case, these five artists let their creativity shine. They hope to continue to expand their boundaries for future exhibits.