St. Michael-Albertville Artists Earn Accolades at Conference Exhibition

Six STMA High School students were among the winners of the Mississippi 8 Conference Visual Arts Festival hosted at St. Michael-Albertville High School. The STMA winners were: Katie Whitley, 1st in Black & White Drawing, Tanner Altenhofen, 2nd in Color Drawing, Josie Novak 1st and Erin Merkl 3rd in Painting and Laura Posthumus 1st and Sara Jean 3rd in Photography.

The annual event rotates between the other schools in the conference and is open to any high school art student in the conference membershipo.

“The best way for students to get involved in our school is to actively participate in the Visual Art Department at STMA High School,” said Reid Thorpe, STMA High School Art teacher.

There are 12 categories for students to choose from: Drawing (black/white), Drawing (color), Painting (acrylic), Painting (watercolor), Sculpture, Ceramics, Photography, Mixed Media, Graphic Art, Printmaking, Jewelry and Fiber Arts.

Each of the conference schools are allowed 20 entries to the show and then outside judges are brought in to judge the works without knowing students’ names or schools.

Criteria is based on three major things: Media, Design and Content.

“This year I would say STMA had close to 120 pieces submitted, so the art teachers narrowed them down to the 20 that we would submit to the show using the same [criteria the outside judges would use],” Thorpe said.