Central Jersey College Prep Displays Student Art Work

Added by Bill Bowman on May 3, 2019.
Saved under Central Jersey College Prep, Schools

This example of Rangoli art was on display at the Central Jersey College Prep annual art show.

More than 500 pieces of art were displayed May 3 at the annual Central Jersey College Prep Upper School Art Show.

The pieces were done by the school’s middle and high school students.

Most of the art on display was done in pastels, watercolors, pencils and charcoal, said Melissa Gibbs, the school’s art teacher.

There were also some 3-D pieces on display.

Gibbs said the art show is also meant to celebrate the school’s diversity.

“We have a very diverse population here, many different cultures, and that’s part of the celebration of the art, it concentrates a lot on that theme, what culture are you from,” she said.

On the floor outside the auditorium, where the show was held, was a piece of Rangoli art, an Indian art form.

“They make it from powder, they use turmeric powder and all sorts of powder and color,” she said. “They make a design, and it’s supposed to be temporary, like our life.”

Senior Priya Neill said her pieces focused on her feelings about being bi-racial.

“I am half white, half Indian, and kind of the difficulties, the confusion in all of it,” she said of her art. “A lot of my pieces talk about how I’m either hiding my white side from Indian people or hiding my Indian side from white people because it doesn’t feel like I fit into either, when the reality is I fit into both.”

Neill said she uses markers and colored pencils in her work.

“I wanted the people to pop, so I’ll do them in pencil and make the background marker, or I’ll do vice-versa,” she said.

Junior Elle Tetinatos worked in water colors, computer graphics and markers to do her work, which is themed around the Greek mythical figure Icarus.

“I decided to make a character based on the myth of Icarus,” she said. “I am Greek. I really like capturing that sort of energetic feeling in my art.”

Following are some scenes from the art show: