Award-Winning Student Art to be Exhibited at WHS

Art created by five students from Wilton Public Schools received commendations at the state-level annual PTA Reflections Art Competition. In addition, artwork by high school students who won at the local competition will be exhibited at WHS beginning next week.

Started in 1969, the PTA Reflections Program allows students across America to express themselves, explore their creativity, and develop their talents through engaging in the arts in response to a new student-generated theme each year. They can submit their work to be judged, first at the local level; winners then move on to the state level competition, and statewide winners can enter competition at the national level.

The five Wilton students who placed at the state-level judging are:  Will Comer (third place, music composition) and Charlie Jankowski (fourth place, photography) who are both Wilton High School students; Alex Koutsoukos (fourth place, visual arts) and Emily Fields (second place, film production) from Middlebrook; and Harish Subramanian (third place, visual arts) from Cider Mill.

Any student attending a school with a participating PTA may submit one entry per category in up to all six categories:  music composition, video production, dance choreography, literature, photography, and visual arts. This past January, dozens of Wilton students in pre-K through twelfth grade submitted entries to answer this year’s national theme, “The world would be a better place if…”

Organizers say that creating art in response to such a question allows students to engage both their creativity and open-ended thinking, while nurturing both artistic and intellectual originality.

An exhibit will showcase all entries submitted by high school students at the local, first-stage level in visual arts, photography, literature and music composition (except the first-place-winning ones). Those works will be displayed in the Wilton High School library May 26-June 12.

Results of the town-level judging performed by the Wilton PTA for all grade levels are included at the end of this article.

This year, the Wilton PTA’s program was promoted by WHS junior Jessica Kobsa, who made a presentation to a class, used social media, and popularized the contest in WHS’s Open Art Club to encourage participation. Posters hung in the high school by the chair of the Reflections Program at WHS, Kathie Mandel, and blurbs in the school newsletters also helped popularize the contest at WHS.

Natalie Schiavone, a junior at WHS and third-place winner in the visual arts category, was happy with her decision to participate in the Reflections program. “I’d never done the Reflections Art Contest before, but after I did it gave me a chance express myself in ways that I don’t usually get to at school. I’ve been into art for years now and once I saw the flyer, I had to participate,” she said.

After winning first place in visual arts at WHS and representing Wilton at the state-level judging, WHS junior Katie Cunningham, says she loved the challenge.

“I have always loved arts and crafts so when I heard about the competition, I thought it would be the best time to show people what I can do. Since the theme for this year’s competition was ‘A world would be a better place if…’, I thought that it would be best to create a world surrounded by words, such as peace and love, that I believe would truly make the world a better place to live in. It was an honor for me to represent Wilton High School in the state competition and I am so grateful that Wilton gives its students the opportunity to enter competitions such as these.”

Wilton High School winners

Visual arts

First place:  Kathryn Cunningham
Second place:  Jessica Kobsa
Third place:  Natalie Schiavone
Honorable mentions:  Emma Keating and Ashley Li

Photography

First place:  Charles Jankowski
Second place:  Zoe Lash
Third place:  Megan Giorno (main article picture)
Honorable mention:  Michael McElroy

Literature

First place:  Jeromy DiGiacomo

Music Composition

First place:  Will Comer

Middlebrook winners

Visual Arts

First place:  Alexander Koustoukos
Second place:  Anika Bhagavatula
Third place:  Elizabeth Yoon
Honorable mention:  Daniel Hong
Notable participants:  Zara Wiest, Ronia Clarence, Dalton DiCamillo, Ryan McElroy

Photography

First place:  Henri Pani Connors
Second place:  Ryan McElroy
Third place:  Kira Skye Howard

Literature

First place:  Vignesh Subramanian
Second place:  Dalton DiCamillo
Third place:  Jonathan Wu

Film Production

First place:  Emily Rocio

Cider Mill winners

Visual Arts

First place:  Harish Subramanian
Second place:  Fiona Conway
Third place:  Caroline Yoon
Honorable mentions:  Tina Pamnani, Lucy Beach, Aislyn Conway, Howard Fields

Music Composition

First place:  Jessica Wu

Dance choreography

First place:  Samhita Kakarlapudi

Miller-Driscoll Elementary winners

Visual Arts

First place:  Sahana Bhagavatula
Second place:  Scarlett DiCamillo
Third place:  Sofia Lugo