Painting Their Way to the Top

Ten AHS students participate in the District Art Show

Navya Kaur

Staff Writer

Every year, the Fremont Unified School District (FUSD) holds a District Art Show, where select students from junior high and high schools have the opportunity to display their art for the rest of the school communities to see.

This year, the art show was held on April 15 and ten students from American High School were chosen to participate: Karen Ku (12), Sanjana Naik (12), Lucy Huang (12), Nick Le (12), Rachel Palmon (12), Arielle Visperas (12), Julianne Reyes (12), Kai Wen “Kevin” Jin (11), Chitwan Kaudan (12), and Kristy Hong (11).

“I really felt honored that I qualified to be a part of all these talented students from all these schools,” Art 1 junior Hong said. “I never thought my work was that extravagant, so I was pretty surprised when I heard that my work was going to be displayed.”

    Since many students have not had their art selected in the past, having their art on display this year had a big impact on some students like Jin.

“[This opportunity] impacted me by boosting my confidence as a painter,” Art 3 junior Jin said. “I was ecstatic. It felt awesome to be considered.”
The District Art Show was also a breaking point for many students; it gave them a realization that their art was worthy of recognition.

“This experience made me realize such programs [are] available for all students and I thought it [was] a wonderful experience for students who want to make their art work known to the public,” Hong said.

For many of the selected students, art has been a prominent part of their lives. Each of them draw inspiration from different things to create their own unique art pieces.

“Art is a way I am able to express myself creatively, whether it may be of my thoughts or feelings,” Hong said. “[It] also gave me a unique way of communicating my emotions with others in a way that would be perceived differently by each individual. I would say my sister influenced me the most.”

Hong draws inspiration from her family members, but Jin looks to past Impressionist artists to inspire his artwork.

“I was influenced by Monte and Degas for my art piece, which is a painting of my favorite girl group member in Girl’s Generation, Yuri,” Jin said. “I got the idea from a perfume advertisement [Girl’s Generation] was endorsing.”

While Jin directed his painting on one particular person, Hong created an acrylic painting of the night sky.

“My art piece had stars completely covering a gradient sky of blue and green, and a silhouette of a few trees and swans. I was, at first, inspired to paint the galaxy, but seeing that our classroom didn’t have that much paint, I decided to make my sky simpler,” Hong said. “I’ve always been fascinated by the vastness of the unending sky and all the mystery it and awe it inspired.”