The students of the Advanced Art classes have been transforming areas around the high school into installation art projects. Merriam-Webster defines installation as “a work of art that usually consists of multiple components often in mixed media and that is exhibited in a usually large space in an arrangement specified by the artist.”
Many of the Advanced Art students accompanied other Art Club members to the Mattress Factory in Pittsburgh on Feb. 24. The old Stearns & Foster mattress factory has been transformed into a contemporary art museum and experimental lab where artists come from all over the world to transform areas, rooms, floors and even buildings into masterpieces. These art students were inspired for their own installation art projects and got to work at the beginning of March.
Seniors Olivia Jansen, Jodie Willis, Juniors Heather Dunbar and Destiny Ebert chose to transform the hallway corner between Mr. Aaron Fitzpatrick’s room and the DTV room.
Inspired by Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon album cover, they darkened the corner by blacking out the window and lights. Using white and colored string, they illustrated white light stretching from the window into a prism, built with wire and paper, and a rainbow coming out the other side.
Seniors Lea Gualtieri, Rachel Mazzetti and Junior Breanna Leasure worked in the cafeteria. They built a 3D ice cream cone around one of the poles in the cafeteria. Using painted paper, they constructed an ice cream cone featuring scoops of mint chocolate chip, black raspberry, cotton candy and banana ice creams. Then they hung origami ice cream drips from the ceiling using fishing line.
“Overall, we are striving to make something fun and cool to look at in the cafeteria for everyone!” Gualtieri said.
Senior Sandra Vacca chose to work independently in the high school library. Drawing inspiration from installation artist Mike Stilkey and her own loves of literature and art, she assembled a wall-like stack of hard back books and painted on the binds.
“It [is] a collaboration of infamous illustrations of books,” Vacca said.
Juniors Autumn Ashurst, Kayla Carpenter, Tara Carr, Madeline Kiefer and Meghan Kiefer installed their art in the hallway outside the art room. They folded over 100 white origami cranes of varying sizes and suspended them in an arch using colored sewing thread. The arch stretches towards the ceiling light so that it looks like the birds are flying towards it. They were inspired by Lou Adams, who works with suspended cranes.
Seniors Shianna Metzgar, Skylar Corfield and Junior Jordan Herzog put their art outside of Mr. Nate Langelli’s room. They used wood, paint and plastic army men to create a patriotic installation. They painted the American flag on a piece of wood, spray painted the army men red and white and fastened them to the flag with hot glue.
Seniors Deanna Drobka, Grace Hutchison and Tyler Ujhazy constructed their piece in the stairwell beside Langelli’s classroom. Using cardboard, pillow stuffing, iridescent paper, fishing line, paint and glitter, the students transformed the area to look like a dreamland. They have covered the windows and doors with triangles of iridescent paper, hung clouds made of pillow stuffing and constructed cardboard crystals growing out of the walls and floor.
“We want people to feel like they are almost in another world when walking through that space,” Drobka said.
While some installation art is created with the intention of viewer interaction, these pieces were not. Please respect the artists’ hard work and commitment and do not touch the installations. These pieces will be displayed until mid-April.