Stellar Perceptions: An Artistic Showcase by the Students of St. Thomas Aquinas High School

Deadlines, weekly sketchbook homework, various lessons and labs, paired with sports, biology tests, driver’s ed appointments, and jobs. The art students from St. Thomas Aquinas balance a lot throughout the year, and yet they still find time to create an amazing body of work, year after year. The staff and fellow students at our school know this well, but what about everyone else in Kenora?
The “Stellars” is the name of the awards banquet that honours students in all areas of the arts at St. Thomas Aquinas. It is an opportunity to recognize and celebrate, with our families, student accomplishments within our school. These artworks represent the process of creative nurturing and technical skill we strive to instill in our art students. Many are multi-disciplinary within the arts — they are actors, musicians, dancers, industrial designers, visual artists, and videographers. Art is their “thing” and an aspect of their identity.
Students in grades nine through twelve enrolled in Visual Arts classes have created this artwork throughout the year. They explored a variety of themes: still-lives inspired by the artist Paul Cézanne; nature studies based on their own outdoor photography; introspection through self-portraits; and landscape studies inspired by artists such as Walter J. Phillips, The Group of Seven, and Kenora’s own Melissa Jean.
For these students, this showcase is the culmination of a creative process which began with an idea in a sketchbook, and finished with their piece on display in their community. For some, this exhibition is merely an interesting Snapchat moment in their year; for others this exhibition may affirm a life-long interest of creative pursuits; then there are those for whom this is the catalyst that begins their journey of becoming a practicing artist.
We hope you enjoy this window into what the next generation of local artistic talent has been up to down in the art room of St. Thomas Aquinas High School.
Barry Kraynyk – teacher
Did you know?
The original telegraph lines from Winnipeg to Rat Portage were hung along the tops of living spruce trees.