CDS Artists Head to Tampa Museum of Art

The impact COVID-19 has made on the lives of our students is vividly depicted in the artwork being exhibited by CDS students.

The Tampa Museum of Art's annual 14th Congressional District and Next Generation High School Art Competition features exemplary work created by high school students. Students compete for two top prizes, the Museum Choice Award and the Congressional Choice Award. The artwork selected for the Congressional Choice Award will represent the 14th Congressional District in the Congressional High School Art Competition, which hangs in the Cannon Tunnel of the U.S. Capitol for one year. 

This year, CDS is proud to share that two of our upper school students, Kaylee S. '21 and Angelina B. '22, have been selected to have their artwork featured at the Tampa Museum of Art from March 4, 2021 - April 4, 2021.

Kaylee S. Art

Kaylee S.
CDS Class of 2021
Colors of COVID

Colors of Covid is a photography series. I developed this idea at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. It started out as a piece that brought awareness to the mask shortage but I instead decided to discuss the separation, suffocation, and loneliness caused by COVID-19. Inspired by Andy Warhol's pop-art I used bright pops of color and the repetition of the mask as a cultural icon. I photographed one subject with a mask on in different bright and unusual colored light using her hand and mask positioning to create different metaphors and emotions that together tell a story. The story is one experienced by many Americans. We started out confused but compliant because we thought it would only be a quick temporary thing but in the end, it was much greater than expected. We are deprived of emotion and touch, all alone, and in some cases have given up. I wanted people to look at this piece and know we are alone together.

 

Angelina B. Artwork 2021

Angelina B.
CDS Class of 2022

This piece is an acrylic self-portrait depicting me wearing a crown and jewelry made of syringes to represent how I have finally accepted my trypanophobia as a part of myself despite its ability to control my life and how I perceive my surroundings. Ever since I was little, I have had an extreme phobia of needles(trypanophobia) and to say that it has controlled my life is an understatement. Recently between the global pandemic and personal medical health, this topic of needles and medical equipment has brought me a lot of stress and anxiety. So, I wanted to create a piece that symbolized the hold my phobia has on my life as a way to accept that it exists and that it is a part of me.


Good luck to our amazing CDS artists and thank you to both for sharing their work with us. We would also like the highlight our wonderful CDS Upper School Art teacher, Seth Firestone, for encouraging and inspiring his students.