‘A Celebration Of The Arts’ Showcases The Talents Of Middle School Students

By Jeff White

If pressed, Stephen Moulthroup would probably admit that he prefers to sketch cartoons.

The seventh grader explained this week that drawing has always been a part of his life, since he was in second grade. Although he can draw all types of subject matter, he gravitates toward cartoons, and specifically, large, cartoon-like heads. “When I have free time, I usually take out a sketch pad and draw for a while,” he explained.

And like most artists, sometimes he wants a forum to show off his talent.

Stephen hunkered down over a blank pad of paper Monday night, as Newtown Middle School was turned into an artistic showcase during the first-ever A Celebration of the Arts. Joining Stephen were hundreds of his schoolmates, and a greater number of parents and grandparents, all of who turned out to sample the school’s rich artistic landscape.

The event was meant to showcase art in all its many forms at the middle school, which included theatrical skits, ethnic dancing, pencil sketching, abstract collages, and a medley of music from the school’s many bands and singing groups.

“It’s a real integration of student work,” commented Deborah Kaza, a parent of a seventh grader, as she thumbed through binders of poetry that lined the B-wing corridor. Seeing all the different forms of student art, Mrs Kaza said, brought the work to an extremely personal level. “It’s awesome.”

The two-hour celebration was punctuated by seemingly non-stop performances carried on in different parts of the building. While students in Holly Ferguson’s Spanish class tapped out the last beat of their Hispanic dances in the school’s cafeteria, members of the Jazz Band took the stage for a 30-minute performance in the auditorium.

Sixth graders Elizabeth Gugino, Noreen Barrett and Caitlin Kimball, along with other students in Georgia Batay’s language arts class, took the stage to perform shorts skits in the school’s media center. Although each one-act presentation was backed by weeks of preparation, Ms Batay’s students confessed that once they began, they just did what first came to mind.

“It was really fun when we got up there,” mused Caitlin Kimball. “We just did our own thing.”

“Acting is definitely my favorite thing to do,” she added.

Outside the auditorium, amid stacked cubic collages, four different musical quartets — including flute, trumpet and clarinet quartets — played short movements that caused passersby to stop and crowd together in the foyer.

In an event clearly designed to give a wide variety of activities for attendees, individual displays of student work complimented the various musical, singing, theatrical and dance performances. These included sketch artists Kate Malloy, Allison Hornak and Tyler Von Oy — all of whom, like their classmate Stephen Moulthroup, took position at desks in the B-wing corridor and sketched various items.

Inside classrooms, students read their poetry and rolled red paint over hand-carved Egyptian portraits. Seventh grader Maegen Tannenbaum said she enjoyed making her portrait, because it gave her the freedom to carve a face “that looked interesting.”

Plenty of student work lined the middle school’s hallways, giving parents opportunities to pause in between performances and presentations. Besides a row of 15 desks covered in student poetry, a large “quilt” outside art teacher Claudia Clancy’s classroom was a big draw. Each of her students had been given a square on which they had to depict some form of art, from photography to jazz music.

Although Monday night’s A Celebration of the Arts featured music prominently, the performances were not in lieu of the annual Spring Concert Night, which will still be held this year.

Recognizing that a great deal of preparation was needed in the weeks leading up to A Celebration of the Arts, middle school Principal Diane Sherlock pointed out Monday night that the event really showcased what middle school students have been doing throughout the year, not just in the last month.

“The fact that it is 100 percent kids is what is so exciting to me,” she said. “There is so much talent, so much talent.”