In honor of their two-year long journey through IB Art, the six remaining seniors were finally able to showcase their talents and hard-work in the 2018 IB Art Show. The exhibition took place in the Lecture Hall on both Friday, April 6 and Monday, April 9 and lasted throughout the entire school day. The show was open to anyone, including students and parents, with some of the artists there to help oversee the event.

The show consisted of art from all IB HL Art students, seniors Aldrian Widjaja, Julia Pollard-Grayson, Valerie Groves, Jasmine Milliger, Muskan Momin, and Santiago Le Gall. They began creating the featured art two years ago. The assignment was open-ended, only requiring that the piece had to be a cohesive body of work, directed toward the theme of identity.

“I used to do a lot of colorful stuff so I think I kind of just went with the opposite just to experiment,” Momin said. “I limited myself to a color pallet which I think helped me expand my media a little more.”

The art show was sectioned off by artist, so everyone’s work was set up in the same way. Groves focused her artwork on the central theme of time, playing with the relationship between time and the individual human. One part of her work was a glass composition of a hummingbird, as the bird has been a universal symbol of fleeting time throughout history. 

Pollard-Grayson’s theme for her art was the distortion of voices, which focused on the ways that people change throughout their lives. She used a variety of materials, from fabric ink to photographs, signifying the duality in everyone. Her piece titled “?” was a composition compiled of tiny dots to create hands holding a flower with the words “I’m Still Here” surrounding the picture. Each point was meant to represent the memories that build up over time that create a greater sense of disbelief after one experiences betrayal.

“I know two years seems like a long time to set up an exhibition but most artists set up an exhibition over a five year plus span,” Widjaja said.

Widjaja focused his art around his Indonesian heritage, with portraits of Asian women who all represent aspects of the culture. He also created a portrait of himself as a child, surrounded by colors to reflect his joyful memories of his childhood, despite the ignorance around him. He also created something which stood out in the show, a black and gold paper mache dress, displayed on a mannequin.

“In other IB classes, we are really focused on writing everything, even though we do write a lot here, which you wouldn’t expect from art,” Widjaja said. “But it’s really expressing your emotions and creative thinking through a different media, not just through your writing but by exploring how your art can affect people and how it can have an impact, not only just [on] your community, but in the world.”