The Claire Trevor School of the Arts showcased its undergraduate artists at their Tenth Thursday Undergraduate Exhibit in the Department of Art Courtyard from 6-8 p.m. on June 8.
The exhibit gave undergraduate students the opportunity to display their class projects, which included performance pieces, sculptures and paintings.
For her sculpture class assignment, fourth-year art major Talia Medina had the prompt of monumentalizing something important to her. She created a sculpture with crochet yarn, foil and boxes with the word “strawberry” written on them.
Medina’s sculpture was made to represent agricultural laborers and the work they do.
“My parents immigrated over here and a lot of their initial jobs working here were working in the fields … I’ve worked in the fields as well to make money you know, for college and stuff,” Medina said. “I really wanted to make sure that people get recognition for the work that they do, which is why I chose the material of crochet because [the medium is] just as tedious and [involves] muscle memory type of movement [similar to] working in the fields.”
Second-year art major Grace Hensley showcased a performance piece entitled “Turning 20” that she created for her basic performance art class. For her piece, she designed a cloak made of her childhood clothing. She then threw the cloak off of herself, ending her performance wearing a purple dress and high heels.
“Our theme was ‘extension of the body and costume’ so I knew that I wanted to make something. That’s why I decided to make the cloak out of old clothes,” Hensley said. “[The piece is] supposed to represent a cloak of my childhood burdens and then taking it off and being free and being an adult.”
Third-year business economics major Harper Dhadde heard about the event through her friend who was involved with the exhibit. While she was there, she had taken an interest in one of the digital art slideshow presentations.
“I actually haven’t been to very many of these because I didn’t really have many friends in the art department, but now that I have more friends in the art department, I come out to support more,” Dhadde said. “I think that the slideshow was really cool. I was staring at it for a second, and I want to keep on looking at it.”
Third-year biological sciences major Elby Dumatol also attended the event to support her friends showcasing their work in the exhibit.
“[The event] is really interesting, very abstract. I’m definitely not understanding [the art] at first but everything seems really cool,” Dumatol said. “I’m really thoroughly enjoying all of the structures and like the concepts.” Laiyla Santillan is a Campus News Staff Writer. She can be reached at laiylas@uci.edu.
