Her selection under this year’s artwork theme, “Pond Ecosystem,” was distinct, she said. She’s always loved flowers, and suspected few of her classmates would opt to produce artwork similar to hers.
Alemayehu was a third grader when she started at the Reston, Virginia, magnet school. She noticed how many kids idolized the sixth graders, describing them as older and cooler. One reason for that was the artwork they had the opportunity to produce.
For decades, as part of the school’s artist in residence program, sixth graders have worked with a local artist to produce artwork that gets displayed in the library, hallways or outside the school building.
The school’s PTA covers the program costs and the artwork remains there permanently, offering students an opportunity to establish their legacy before leaving for middle school.
“It lets our sixth graders engage with a professional artist who’s working out in the world to give them a taste of what it would be like to do that, but it also allows them to leave their mark on our school, to create a permanent piece that everybody from years to come will be able to see and engage with,” art teacher Joshua Saville said.
Through the program, students work with a different medium each year. This year, they’re creating a mural with dyed and stitched fabric. The group started by drawing an organism from pond life using a permanent marker. Then, they hand-dyed the fabric.
With oversight from Leesburg-based artist Penny Hauffe, they’re concluding by using embroidery and adding sequins and stitching.
“I get to engage with up-and-coming lovely young people,” Hauffe said. “It gives me, personally, a lot of hope about the future. Whether they love art or not, it doesn’t matter. It’s a really great community get-together.”
Hauffe helped last year’s sixth graders create a painting that recognized wildlife native to Virginia. That mural is now in the school’s library.
For the younger kids on campus, Hauffe said she hopes “they will be excited to participate once they get to sixth grade. It’ll be something that motivates them. Even if they don’t love sewing or ponds or anything like that, it’ll just be the awesomeness of getting together to do something where all the little parts make up a whole.”
Sixth grader Lily chose to depict a koi fish, and enjoyed the exercise because she hasn’t spent a lot of time with tie dye. She was excited about the fact “a piece of me is still at the school.”
Jay also opted for creating a fish and enjoyed the activity, “because you get to be creative and do what you like to do.”
Ava Mirzaie, meanwhile, picked a frog: “I feel really proud of it, because everybody’s going to see it.”
The goal, Saville said, is for students to use art as a means to advance their learning in other subjects and “learn through creating, but then also learn how to engage with art that they see out in the world and appreciate the work and effort that goes into it.”
While Alemayehu’s flower “didn’t exactly turn out how I wanted it to turn out,” she said, “it’s not bad.” Soon, it will live on the wall indefinitely.
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