By Marieke Danniau, Journal contributor
On Dec. 10 at 10 a.m., the San Juan Islands Sculpture Park opens a festive art exhibit featuring the work of Friday Harbor High School’s art students. Facilitated by the high school’s art teacher Andy Anderson and Sculpture Park Education Director David Halpern, 20 students created sculptures inspired by the holiday song “The Twelve Days of Christmas.” Dividing the days amongst themselves, each sculpture is based on a day from the song, with an extra entry from one of the artists. Along with featuring the hard work and accomplishments of young island visual artists, the elementary school choir, directed by Shannon Daskine, will sing holiday songs at the opening of the exhibition. The sculptures will stay in the park through the holidays from Dec. 10 up until New Year’s. The exhibit has been a multiyear-long journey, beginning with Halpern’s idea to include Anderson’s class in some kind of creative collaboration. The idea for this collaboration came from the yearly summer program that Halpern runs, where community members create art together to put in the sculpture park. “I design a sculpture, and it’s sort of open to the public to come and create that sculpture. I try to design it in a way that, you know, anybody who shows up, any age, can participate, and then, in a few hours, we create a sculpture,” Halpern said.
Due to the time of year that the exhibition will go up, students faced problems with the weatherability of their art. The pieces had to be made of materials that could survive the rain and the cold of December. Thus, a large portion of the work is composed, in some part, of ceramic, which takes additional time to fire and glaze. Some artists who have worked on the pieces in the exhibit have since graduated, as they worked on them the year before. The exhibit is a collaboration between grades and classes as well as between the school and the park.
As an athlete and an artist, Halpern wanted to see the visual artists celebrated in a similar way to school sports teams or other arts like theater and music. “I just thought it would be fun to have an event that would give them something of the same feeling of support,” said Halpern. Due to the nature of the visual arts, there typically isn’t as much public attention involved, and an installation at the sculpture park would give these students that opportunity. Halpern added, “And to me, that’s what this is all about, sort of planting the seed to say, ‘You can do this.’”
Sculptures featured will be: “Partridge in a Pear Tree,” by Felicity Schubert and Kate Douglas; “Two Turtledoves,” by Qwynne Price-Morris; “Three French Hens,” by Kayla LaPalme; “Four Calling Birds,” by Georgia Vanderyacht, Emilio Bayas, Elian Bayas and Abdul Guzman-Navarro; “Five Golden Rings,” by Kira Clark; “Six Geese a-Laying,” by Phaedra Tucker-Belt; “Swans a-Swimming,” by Jax Heath and Galilea Torres; “Eight Maids a-Milking” created as a whole group effort; “Nine Ladies Dancing,” by Luca Pignatiello, Kate Douglas, Savannah House, Vincent Sanders, Bryce Ridwan and Francesca Otis; “Ten Lords a-Leaping,” by Lylalynne Frohm; “Pipers Piping,” by Juniper Reynolds; “Twelve Drummers Drumming,” by Norah Leighton and Gabe Peppers; and finally, an additional entry, “Bird in Flight,” by Gabe Peppers.
