From March 6 to April 5, eight Uni artists were featured in a local high school art exhibition, the Eric Show.
Executive Teacher of the Uni Fine Arts Department Lisa Evans describes the Eric Show as a “really, really nice event that our community is lucky to have.”
“It’s a wonderful opportunity for students to share their work with other high school’s art communities,” says Evans.
For her piece, Uni senior Xenia Mongwa created a colored pencil drawing titled Garlic, But I Ruined It. Mongwa says her inspiration was a photo she saw on Twitter. “I just liked the lighting,” she says. “It was fairly simple — just garlic.” The artwork features garlic in muted shades of pink and red, with radiating black accents framed around it against a dark blue background.
“It’s based on a photo I took in Japan on the way to China,” freshman Max Wang says of his watercolor painting titled Consumerism. “There was a lot of color and it’s about Shibuya Crossing, a really big intersection, but there’s one person standing there. Normally there’s a lot of people because it’s the busiest crossing. … I used a lot of different materials and it was a new experience for me.”
Bruce Tang, junior, explained the background behind his photo Synchronism. “I tend to walk around and take photos sometimes and this one day — it was during my free period — I came across the parking garage where I park my car,” he says. “I was taking photos around there and … there was the glass of the stairway and also someone crossing the street and it created a nice geometric composition.”
Junior Evie Parker’s piece titled Wolpertinger was an assignment for a Uni art elective where students had to make a mask of a mythological character. “Mine was a Wolpertinger, this German jackalope with fangs and wings,” Parker says. She adds that she was happy about getting Honorable Mention. “In the Eric Show, there’s a lot more art pieces than a small works show, so I was really happy that mine got Honorable Mention.”
Noor Elbanna, junior, cites both her assignment for art class and her Egyptian culture as what inspired her to create her mixed-media piece Maat. “In Studio Art, led by Ms. Evans, we were tasked with creating masks for our mythology project,” writes Elbanna. “While researching I stumbled across Maat, and the more I read about her, the more fascinated I became.” Elbanna describes Maat as the goddess of justice, truth, and moderation in Egyptian mythology. “In the end, Ms. Evans encouraged me to submit to the Eric Show, which was an amazing experience.”
For the show, junior Khuyen Nguyen made a painting titled Innocence. “I’m inspired by a lot of memories and familial things,” Nguyen writes. “My piece was referenced by one of these childhood photos of me and my sister.” Nguyen’s medium was acrylic, with strong brush strokes and vivid colors.
Freshman Gail Fields says she had almost forgotten to make her piece, Wanderlust, for the show. The night before the pieces were due, she says she “spent hours pacing around trying to find out what to do.” After combining three different shades — purple, green, and gold — she got the idea to “have just a purple silhouette holding this golden, dripping ball.” She says she wanted to have it symbolize “something new, something happy, and something sad.” With the time she had, Fields says she thinks her piece turned out well.
Junior Ivy Pullen-Huemann’s piece Bubble Bath features a variety of mixed medium materials. “I embroidered a little bath and then I used pearl beads to make the bubbles for the bath,” says Pullen-Huemann. “I saw something like it on Pinterest and decided I wanted to make it.”
Evans talks about Uni’s participation in the show.
“I would say we’ve been a part of it for maybe ten years. I’ve participated and had Uni students participate every time we were asked,” she says.
The Eric Show was created in 2010 in memory of Eric Steffesen to “honor Eric’s legacy by encouraging young artists in the community to pursue their artistic dreams.”
Between the mounted canvases and the beautiful artwork, walking through the Eric Show in the Illini Union Art Gallery is almost surreal.
Evans says, “They do a wonderful job hanging the show, they provide mats for people … it makes the work look really good.”
