Newtown Middle School Celebrates The Arts

By Nancy K. Crevier

After nearly an entire school year of creating and preparation and three days of nonstop work to display hundreds of works throughout the school, Newtown Middle School opened its doors to friends and families of the seventh and eighth grade students Tuesday evening, May 1, at 6, for the annual Celebration of the Arts.

Viewers were treated to brightly colored self-portraits in the Fauvist style waving from the lobby rafters, bigger than life constructions of ordinary household objects, and architectural models placed one after the other on long tables flanking the side of the lobby area. More than 800 paper faces of Greek gods, fashioned using sculpture techniques such as cutting, scoring, pleating, and curling, gazed down from the walls, the work of every seventh grade student in the school.

Art instructor Arlene Spoonfeather proudly showed off the school’s literary magazine Opus Optima, a collection of poems, stories, and drawings by middle school authors. “It is incredible what the kids come up with. It is just an amazing magazine,” she said. The magazine is put together by the school, she explained, but is produced by Image 1 in Monroe, giving it a very slick look.

As guests strolled the halls, dozens of life-sized paper circus figures danced across the walls, their eighth grade creators having given them life in the poses the figures struck and the brilliant colors of their costumes. Looking up as one passed through the lobby into a hallway wing, piñatas of all shapes and sizes bobbled above. A light bulb, a Smiley face, a penguin, pig, and dragon were just a few of the Mexican papier maché creations that the middle school artists had constructed.

Student artists worked on sculpting and drawing in one hallway, pausing to explain their handiwork to curious bystanders. Pencil drawings and floral paintings posted on the walls looked over their shoulders as the students worked.

Up the stairs from the lobby, the tech-ed classroom was a vivid jolt of light, electricity, energy, and motion bursting forth from various displays. Many of the inventions were hands-on productions, to the delight of several people wandering through. Pulleys pulled, lights blinked, gears clicked, and generators whirred. This was clearly not the industrial arts classroom of yesteryear.

The music department is always a vital part of the Celebration of the Arts, and this year was no different, despite the lack of an auditorium in which to perform. In one small room, music students presented solo recitals, percussion ensemble pieces, and music from the Newtown Middle School Jazz Band throughout the evening, all under the direction of music teachers Keith Hedin and Mark Mahoney.

Students staffed computers to demonstrate various aspects of computer capabilities in the library, surrounded by yet more examples of student artwork. A peek into the cafeteria revealed examples of the creativity of the GATES students, including a CANstruction that they will be entering into competition the week of May 7.

“We are just so proud of what these students have done this year,” said Claudia Mitchell, also an art instructor at the school. “We have some truly talented and amazing kids this year.”