SALISBURY – A number of student artists from Worcester County are among those whose work is featured in the annual student art exhibit at the Ward Museum of Wildfowl Art.
A reception Feb. 19 honored students from throughout the region as their work was unveiled in the Welcome Gallery at the Ward Museum. This year’s student art show kicked off Friday and continues through March 27.
Debra Passalacqua, art teacher at Snow Hill Middle School, submitted drawings from several of her students to the show.
“What I liked was the theme,” she said. “We got to do a lot of discussion about how water effects everything.”
Stephen Decatur High School junior Nick Ager is pictured with his work. Photos by Charlene Sharpe
The Ward Museum of Wildfowl Art hosts a non-competitive student art show each spring. Students from kindergarten through 12th grade are invited to submit artwork that relates to a chosen theme. This year’s theme, “Water is for Everyone,” encouraged students to think about the importance of water on a local and even global scale.
“We had a well-rounded discussion about how important water was,” said Passalacqua, who suggested her sixth-graders to draw pieces for the show.
Snow Hill Middle School sixth-grader Brianah Shockley said her drawing incorporated the use of shading, a skill Passalacqua recently taught students, and provided her with the chance to be creative. The piece she now has hanging on the wall at the Ward Museum features a bottle in the ocean, collecting rainwater from a cloud.
“I doodle clouds all the time so I wanted to use that in my artwork,” she said.
Fellow Snow Hill Middle student Natalie Bowden used the phrase “raining cats and dogs” as the inspiration for her work, which features falling raindrops interspersed with everyday objects.
Passalacqua said she was thrilled that so many of her students created images for the show.
“I love the Ward Museum,” she said. “I like to support the programs here. It’s such a quality institution.”
Snow Hill Middle sixth grader Natalie Bowden is pictured below her raindrops piece.
Stephen Decatur High School teacher Christy Powell agreed. She tasked each of her advanced art students with creating an image for the show. While many of the entries were drawings, eleventh-grader Nick Ager put his efforts into a painting depicting the earth inside a water droplet falling from a spigot.
“I really wanted to do a water droplet,” he said.
Powell said the Ward Museum show provided Ager and his peers with the chance to appreciate the different ways they approached the same assignment.
“It gives all the students an opportunity to come together and look at one another’s work and see each other’s interpretations,” she said.
Salisbury Mayor Jake Day, one of several speakers during Friday’s opening reception, said he was glad to see area students and community members take advantage of the beautiful Ward Museum and at the same time be encouraged to think about such an important theme.
“I’m incredibly grateful we live in a place where not only do we have beautiful water resources but we also have Maryland’s best drinking water,” he said.
The Ward Museum’s student exhibit remains in the Welcome Gallery until March 27. For more information call 410-742-4988.