Southwest artists beautify the campus.
As you are walking down the hallways of Southwest High School, you stop in your tracks and notice a classroom door has been vandalized with a skillfully made art composition. Should you report it? There is no need. It is just the work of an artist doing what they do best.
In early April, students from the Southwest Academy for the Visual and Performing Arts and advanced art class collaborated with various teachers around campus to create a beautiful art composition on their classroom doors.
Jacqueline Pleitez, Southwest High School art teacher, said she was motivated to do a project that involved implementing artwork around the school in order to add more life and color to the school.
“I really wanted to do more art work outside the classroom and to have the community appreciate and value the artistic skills of our students,” said Pleitez.
The classroom doors were selected by the artists themselves. The students’ assignment was to communicate with the teachers about how the artist was going to execute their artwork on the classroom doors. The subjects that were implemented in the composition depended on what the teacher liked or what subject they teach.
Kenya Verduzco, 17-yearold Southwest senior and third year art student, said she liked working alongside Omar Bouomar in creating an art composition on his science classroom door.
“Since Mr. Bouomar is a biology teacher, I thought it was appropriate to draw a heart and lungs. So I made a colored sketch and had it approved by the teacher,” said Kenya.
What Kenya said she enjoyed most about this project was using chalk as her principal medium.
“It was the first time I make an artwork using chalk and it was different from the usual work we do in class,” said Kenya.
Jacklin Huerta, Southwest English teacher, said she had a wonderful experience collaborating with Denise Cruz, one of her students and SAVAPA artist, in creating a chalk composition that would be displayed on her door.
“I wanted her to use things that were related to literature … having concepts, themes or quotes from some of the (books) we have read in English 10 honors,” said Huerta.
The artwork on Huerta’s classroom door includes quotes from famous excerpts in literature such as “Julius Caesar,” “Oedipus Rex,” “Antigone,” “Lord of the Flies,” and “Catcher on the Rye” as well as some of Huerta’s favorite authors.
“(Southwest) has a lot of students that have great talent and they need to have experiences to show everyone else,” said Huerta.
Huerta said that she believes that art is a subject that easily gets overlooked by many people because they think that someone can only have a career if you are good at math or science.
“We need art. I think we need more art everywhere. It gives (the school) more culture and makes it more cheerful,” said Huerta.
The artwork on the doors not only had to reflect the subject taught in the classroom, but it could also embody the teacher’s personal interests.
Aaron Cortez, 17-year-old Southwest junior and SAVAPA art student, said he was lucky enough to work with Joyce Sullivan, Southwest High School mathematics teacher, because like him, Sullivan is a Star Wars fanatic.
“It was something that I knew about and enjoyed,” said Aaron.
Aaron said it was hard at first to collaborate with someone else. This was because the object of the project was to make the teacher happy with the final draft of the composition.
“It took a long time to make the plan for it actually. I had to ask for what she wanted and I only knew that she liked Star Wars,” said Cortez.
Aaron’s final composition on Sullivan’s door features Princess Leia and Luke Skywalker in the middle, R2-D2 on the lower left hand corner, and CP3O on the upper right hand corner.
In addition to doing art on classroom doors, Pleitez thought it would be fun for the art students to paint on various trash cans located throughout the school.
Gabriela Cuevas, 17-yearold Southwest senior and advanced art student, said she believes that having artwork on the trash cans makes the school feel more lively.
“Some of the dull gray trash cans are now full of color and the lain doors have become more interesting,” said Gabriela.
Not only that, but the art students have been receiving a lot of positive feedback.
“I do believe that art should be shared and taken out to the school and community. It is a way of portraying students’ talent and the art class that a lot of others don’t know about.
Now that the hallways are filled with art, Southwest students can go about their day looking at it. Some students have even taken picture with them sharing them on social media.
“It is a really good opportunity for (the school) to showcase the artwork of the students. Because (the artwork) is on the door, a lot of students who are not taking art or are not as connected to art can really value and appreciate the art,” said Pleitez.