Another Day in the Country
Being overtaken
© Another Day in the Country
It’s that time of year when the Artful Eye Show is coming up for Centre Elementary students, grades 3 to 5. It’s happening on May 9, with doors to the art exhibit opening at 6:30 p.m.
My house, where a year’s worth of artwork from 32 prolific students is stored, has been overtaken.
One bedroom has been designated as the current staging area. Everything that’s been created since September and stored in various places around the premises is now in one room — mostly.
Stacks of matted pictures and canvasses along with boxes of clay masterpieces, decorated gourds, and even Bavarian Easter eggs end up all through the house.
Our judge for this year’s show is Dennis Medina, retired curator for the Eisenhower Museum in Abilene.
Among other things, Dennis is an abstract artist, a skilled quilter, and an avid art collector. A sampling of his artwork and a quilt will be on display in the Centre Elementary small gym, which we will do our best to turn into an art gallery.
After Dennis got through judging this year’s show around my kitchen table, with all the extra leaves added for ease of display, he said, “Your students are producing wonderful, consistent work. When I was their age, I remember my art classes as being tedious and boring. It all changed my senior year in high school. I wish I could have started with teachers like these children have.”
That was quite a compliment. I think my young students are amazing. They pick up a pencil and begin to draw. However, when I show their work to someone new, I wonder whether I’m biased, like an overprotective grandmother.
Some years, I’ve held some art projects back from being judged — like the end-of-the-year canvas paintings that are done only in 5th grade.
Handling acrylic paint is a trick for an adult to learn, and working on a larger scale also is difficult. So, I’ve usually withheld those completed paintings from being judged. It’s just too subjective.
However, this year, we put everything into the mix. Judging such a variety of work was a big job. I was worried that the judge would be overwhelmed. He wasn’t, even though it took four hours to complete.
“The time flew by,” Dennis said, enjoying the process so much.
One of the interesting types of art we studied this school year was artwork created for stamps.
“Philatelic” is a new word in our vocabulary, thanks to the clerk at Ramona’s post office, who introduced me to a quarterly magazine put out by the U.S. Postal Service about all the beautiful stamps the service creates every year.
In a world in which children know very little about letter writing in general and stamps in particular, I thought it was time they were introduced.
The kids took on the challenge of reproducing stamps as forms of art. Stamp art was such a hit we made it into a category of its own. One piece of stamp art was chosen from each grade represented, and a unique ribbon, especially created for this occasion, will be awarded to the winners.
“You can never have too many ribbons,” my sister Jess tells me.
Speaking of being overtaken, I was overtaken by surprise when I opened my mailbox one day this past week and found an envelope addressed to me from my grandson, who is graduating from high school in a few weeks.
I recognized his handwriting — neat, precise printing that could almost be a typeface on a computer.
“Could this be a graduation announcement?” I wondered to myself.
But the envelope was business style, borrowed from the place where his mother works.
I stood there beside the mailbox, looking at the letter. This boy just turned 18, and this is the first letter I’ve ever received from him.
Kids his age don’t write letters. He has included notes on birthday cards the family sends. He’s written tags on presents at Christmas. He regularly texts me and occasionally sends an email but never has written me a real letter. And here I have one in my hand.
“The magazine article about the tennis player was really interesting, Baba,” he began. “Thanks for sending it. I’ve decided to try to answer every letter you send me with actual paper correspondence, even though it takes more orchestration to get the stamps and envelope than to just send a text.”
“Hallelujah,” I said to my cat, who was the only one listening. On another day in the country, I’m completely overtaken.