Artist’s work is winning design

Staff report

YOUNGSTOWN

Cynthia Tackett is the winner of the 2017 First Night Youngstown button contest.

Her entry in the annual competition to create a drawing that sums up the event was chosen by the FNY board. It will grace all admission buttons.

Tackett began studying art at age 6, and continued at Boardman High School and Youngstown State University. She said the idea for her design, which integrates many FNY themes, came from family memories of winter fun and New Year’s Eve. It depicts fireworks exploding over the skyline, with silhouetted figures watching, playing in an orchestra and ice skating.

Tackett’s work has been displayed in several shows and galleries, including the Butler Institute of American Art, the Tampa Museum of Art and the Nissen Gallery in Warren. She hosts “sip and paint” and kids’ birthday parties, and gives individual and group art lessons to adults and children. She also has published a novel, “The Cameo Connection,” under her pen name, Cynthia Sahyoun. To learn more, go to artcreativestudio.com.

The FNY opening ceremony will take place on the ice at Covelli Centre after the Phantoms’ afternoon hockey game, and Tackett’s daughters, Alli and Venezia, will be there to represent their mother.