On May 20, students exhibited their artwork at this year’s AP Art Night, an event hosted in the upstairs pool lobby open to students and the community to attend. Through the event, participants can view and appreciate what the artists have been working on throughout the school year. They also have the opportunity to talk to the artists themselves about their investigations.
“[AP Art Night] is just powerful,” said Jessica Mohagen, AP Art teacher. “I love being able to facilitate a space for students to be brave and to try new things.”
Over the span of the school year, each student creates 15 pieces of art guided by an inquiry-based question, which is called a sustained investigation. The students can make other pieces, but this collection usually makes up the majority of their art portfolio.
“[My sustained investigation] is how my experiences in Wisconsin’s environment have shaped who I am today and who I’m becoming because I did Watershed [Wisdom] and ELS, and those were really pivotal things for me,” said Lena Cole, senior and AP Art student.
The event encourages the community to connect with students through art. Additionally, it serves as practice for the students to explain what their artwork is and the message behind it.
“Half of the class is making the art, but the other half is learning how to communicate your ideas and concepts, which is most of what the AP test actually is,” said Margo Heaviland, senior and AP art student. “This is why AP Art Night is so fun, artists get an opportunity to talk to people about their art and get perspectives they wouldn’t in the classroom.”
The tradition of AP Art Night began long before Mohagen started working at Shorewood, but she has made several changes to the event. Most notably, she moved the show from the art rooms to the upper pool lobby.
“I had noticed, when I got here, the really cool upstairs pool lobby with these blank white walls,” said Mohagen. “So I would bring my students up there to create artwork and we do critiques up there. Then, I just kind of said, ‘Well, why don’t we use this as our gallery space?’”
Mohagen credits the experimentation evident in the students’ displays with the unconventional shape and new environment of the pool lobby.
“They sometimes hang things from the ceiling, or glue a couple pieces together, or draw on a paper background, and they can get really creative with this space and really make it their own personality.”
Heaviland’s sustained investigation circles around how she expresses herself and the things that make her who she is. She used items she considered joyful, such as foods and quilting to express this, but her more sentimental works ended up sticking with her the most.
“My favorite piece is called ‘Quality Time’ which is a charcoal drawing of my mom, thinking about how my time will be limited with her when I go to college, so I used charcoal to express my sadness with that,” Heaviland said.
For Cole, seeing the diverse range of ideas and art styles at AP Art Night takes the pressure off the creative process.
“When you look at the people’s art on AP Art Night, everyone’s doing super different stuff,” Cole said. “Someone’s doing metal work this year; other people are doing sculptures, and someone else is sewing. If it’s literally anything imaginable, it will fit into AP Art.”
According to Heaviland, AP Art class is different from other art classes because of how it stretches students’ abilities, both artistically and critically.
“Lots of people assume art is a very easy class, but what they don’t see is all of the thought that gets put into it,” Heaviland said. “Rather than the studio art classes, AP Art challenges you to be an artist rather than just make art, which means you need to think critically about your art.”
As AP Art Night approached, students made posters to promote the event, planned out how they were going to display their work, prepared their art for presentation, and wrote artist statements. In addition, the students provided the food and chose the music.
“There’s a lot of technical work that has to go into it because you have to finalize all your pieces, make them presentable,” Cole said. “You have to mat them and make them look like they would if they were in a museum. Then there’s a lot of writing and reflection that goes into it too.”