Written by Ariana Jones

The DP Visual Arts Exhibition is looked forward to by all of the RCHK audience. It is a time for the current Year 13 Visual Art students to finally present their long awaited artwork. This year’s three-day event, which opened on March 19, once again captivated browsers, with the appearance of stormtrooper-based political artwork, photography, 3D models, digital portraits, arts and crafts and much more.

The Year 13s were given the whole academic year to create their own pieces of artwork before they had to put them up. Higher level art students were required to produce a minimum of eight pieces, while standard level students only needed to create half as many.

Time is an important factor. “There was a year to do the exhibition, but we didn’t have as much time as the Year 12s do for next year, since we had to complete three units before starting our work when we were in Year 12,” higher level student Po Yee Fong said.  

Still, even with cramming in all the artwork along with their exams, students expressed that they thought a year was plenty of time. Yee Loong Tang, who worked on both paintings and photography, stated that he thought that, “It wasn’t easy, but it was one less exam. There was enough time. But I managed my time poorly.”

Sameera Pelham, Visual Arts teacher to many of the students involved, also noted that, “I thought that the quality of the artwork was good this year, it’s just that many of the students didn’t manage their time properly.”

Although the amount of work required was asking quite a lot of the students, they were left with a lot of free choice to develop their own sense of style. “The goal of the exhibition was so that the students develop their own personal style,” said Pelham.

This freedom to work on personal artistic expression meant  that the students could put a lot of thought into the intention and meaning behind their artwork. Students were very creative and diverse in ideas as a result.

Another requirement was for the media to be ranged, so this element was also very varied, a fact noted by many of the viewers at the exhibition. Multiple anonymous students from younger year levels thought that some of the artwork was very rushed, agreeing on thoughts such as, “It looks like they spent like, a day doing it,” when encountering more unconventional, abstract pieces.

The Year 13 students had to create, not to mention display, their artwork in such a way that they could entirely present the theme of their series work. “The ideas took a lot of time to complete, because there was more of a cohesive goal. So I had to make ideas connect,” said Anson Cheung, a student who used laundry and paint to communicate her themes of healing and trauma.

The quality of the artwork was most certainly marked as well, but the connection of each art piece to one another as well as the communication of each student’s specific theme was the focus of the exhibition. The gallery was an amazing display for the younger students and proud parents alike, as well as being an opportunity for the Year 13s to develop individual artistry:  hopefully in preparation for potential exhibits in their years to come beyond RCHK.