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Canfield High students win honors for art and writing
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Catherine Brown, 19, left, and Ariana Ellis, 18, who both graduate from Canfield High School next month, are 2013 National Medal winners in the 90th Scholastic Art and Writing Awards. Brown won an American Visions Medal for her mixed media artwork, “Frightened,” and Ellis won a silver medal for each of her two writing submissions.
By Denise Dick
Canfield
Two Canfield High School students are following in the footsteps of literary and artistic legends including Andy Warhol and Truman Capote.
Catherine Brown, 19, and Ariana Ellis, 18, who both graduate next month, are 2013 National Medal winners in the 90th Scholastic Art and Writing Awards.
Brown won an American Visions Medal for her mixed- media artwork, “Frightened,” and Ellis won a silver medal for each of her two writing submissions, one a persuasive piece called, “Abnormal is the New Normal” and the other a humorous selection called “A Lady of the Evening.”
Both learned of the honor at school last month.
“I was freaking out,” Ellis said.
“I was surprised,” Brown said.
Brown’s work is a portrait of the artist ducking under a school desk, surrounded by the rubble of buildings demolished by a disaster. Four layers of cardboard comprise the background with the portrait painted in acrylic.
She got the idea from watching “duck-and-cover” movies from the 1950s during history class. Though students were instructed to duck under their desks in the event of nuclear disaster, it wouldn’t have saved them.
Kevin Hoops, her art teacher, said that while Brown’s technique is excellent, he believes what appealed to judges was that the work is personal.
In the past four years, three Canfield High students’ artwork has earned National Scholastic Medals. Besides Hoops, the school’s art department includes Katherine Bernard and Pete Graff.
The awards ceremony is tonight at Carnegie Hall in New York City, and Brown and her family are going. Because Ellis starts classes at Northeast Ohio Medical University the day after graduation, she decided not to attend the ceremony.
Ellis’ persuasive piece tells about the changes from a traditional family to families of all kinds. Her humorous work is about a girl living with her parents even though she’s at the age when most young people move out.
“It’s me, but I embellished it a lot,” she said.
Gretchen Sprague, Ellis’ English teacher, said this is the first time a Canfield student’s writing has been recognized in the national competition.
“And she got two silver medals,” she said.
Sprague added that Ellis has a knack for thinking “outside of the box” that she believes resonated with judges.
Both students enjoy their artistic pursuits outside of school as well.
“I write at home,” Ellis said. “It’s mostly creative writing.”
Brown, who will study early-childhood education at Miami University next year, makes jewelry using beads and glass and sometimes paints.