Issuu

“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth...and on the sixth day he made man after his own image.”

“To be creative is to be human.” -Genesis

The fine arts department approaches each student with the belief that everyone has a fundamental and insatiable urge to create. In order to guide the student to a full expression of that urge, we offer opportunities for exploration of the arts disciplines and their potential to communicate the truth of the human spirit. Through ongoing study and application of their craft, students can begin to develop their artistic skills as they seek to elevate their capacity for creative expression.

Jackson Napier

Minimalism

My sustained investigation: How can minimalism photography show deeper meanings when a photo focuses on its fundamental elements?

This investigation explores the interplay of color theory, intriguing color palettes, and subject isolation to elicit specific moods and feelings, such as quietness and isolation. Through carefully selected subject matter on clean backgrounds, I emphasized form and texture. I chose to photograph monotone and two-tone color schemes to keep a consistent theme. I also carefully selected each image to show the true beauty through isolation, which aims to show meanings beyond the obvious.

A Beacons Eye

Braided Beauty

Sandy Snack

Showering Light

The Buildings Edge

The Sea Oat

Peyton Alch

How do different cultures use distinctive art styles to express and preserve their traditions and values? As I was growing up, the subject of my heritage was rarely discussed, leaving me uncertain of my place within the cultures I belong to. My lack of knowledge surrounding my heritage left me with a deep curiosity about the rituals and traditions that connect people to their roots. Through my SI, I explored how diverse cultures use art, both functional and symbolic, to express their values and preserve their histories, gaining a deeper understanding of how art shapes cultural identity and continuity.

Xianguyn Keepsake Box

Ugandan Watering Bell

Roman Mosaic

Grayson McFarlan

A lot of what I paint or draw comes from personal experiences, emotions, or ideals mixed with current interests of mine. These pieces all come from my sustained investigation, which is focused on the exploration of my identity and the question of “who am I?”. It’s been a lot of fun and challenging to figure out how to physically express some of these aspects, doubly so by my choice to incorporate wax into each piece. Keeping a human figure, or some part of the human body, in my works is part of this investigation as well; in my mind, it doesn’t make much sense to have a theme on identity and not have some humanistic shape in view.

Boxed In

Frontiers

Icarus Rising

Writing Worlds

String Theory

Charlotte Davis

Erosion is a quotidian process which can be seen in every landscape. Despite all experiencing a deformation process, each environment differs from the others. Even similar weather can create contrasting patterns in nature. How can pottery portray distinct weather conditions affecting the terrain of landscapes? My SI investigates the effects of wind and water on landscapes around the world. From the early stages of erosion, rocks, to the very end, sand, and minerals are molded to create gorgeous natural patterns. Easily overlooked, erosion must be understood and appreciated for its beauty.

Dune Cups

Splash Bowl

Sea Salt

Wind Vase

Gully Teapot

Aksel Williams

Nighttime Photography

My sustained investigation is guided by the question: How can color grading and postprocessing alter the emotional impact of nighttime, nature, and street images?

Guided by my inquiry question, I am driven to search for a bridge between artificial and natural light captured in my photos and light created in post-production. I am experimenting with different light sources as I journey through different parts of both rural and urban environments. I aim to capture the life that comes out during the nighttime. I search for different light sources, whether a warmer-tone tungsten street lamp or the radiant, colorful LEDs of an open retail center. In all this, I aim to capture the environment clearly, as well as all of the people in it and how they affect it and are affected by it. For each image that I capture, I spend time evaluating it in postprocessing to take advantage of the colors already present in the image and introduce hues that complement and amplify these tones. In doing this, I am truly illuminating the emotional value inspired by the image and illustrating the many different stories unfolding at night.

A Tender Exchange

Celestial Ridge

Neon Silhouette

Tropical Nighscape

Eva Lane

For my sustained investigation I chose to explore childhood trauma and its eternal effects. My goal was to illustrate a feeling rather than a situation, in hopes to bring about understanding and awareness. I wanted to focus a lot on perspective, and how easily things so dire are often ignored. I really enjoyed using pointillism throughout my pieces, but I also experimented with multiple new mediums.

The Boy Behind The Suit

The Wall

In His Fathers Footsteps

William Martyny

How can I incorporate principles and elements of design into everyday functional objects? I’ve always been interested in how artists use elements and principles of design to help deliver their intended message. I wanted to experiment with these different elements to see how I could manipulate them to convey my ideas. I feel like I accomplished this with my first piece, my basket, which was inspired by texture in nature, I used leaf impressions to apply the texture of nature to my piece.

Geo Bowl

Tube Vase

Rocker Basket

Annie Li

I portray the strange, the morbid, and human suffering. For me, art is supposed to incite a reaction, and it doesn’t matter if it is positive or negative. Of my pieces, the only ones that are considered a failure are those that only incite blankness in others.

Aurum

Ihre Königliche Hoheit, Prinzessin Henry

The Promise

Poena Cullei

White Room

Gonzalo Ros Diaz

How do different Native Pacific-Islander cultures represent their art with symbolic figures? My work explored how these cultures use symbolic figures to convey identity, mythology, and spirituality. I focused on traditional carving techniques and cultural motifs, investigating art forms from Polynesia, Micronesia, and Melanesia. This investigation led me to reflect on how symbolism shapes cultural expression, merging both historical traditions and personal interpretation.

Tiki

Island Relic

DumDum

Christine Santos

In my portfolio, I’ve chosen to explore the rich, emotional complexity of simple moments in our everyday lives. The sprawling cityscape, with its endless flow of people, is powered by the constant need to keep moving, striving, and succeeding. It’s a place that seems to demand perpetual motion, where a moment’s rest can feel like falling behind. Yet, even amid its crowded streets and bustling scenes, there’s a sense of loneliness that can persist in one’s mind. In these pieces, I wanted to depict the duality of the city– a place of potential, yet shadowed by the struggle to belong and thrive amid the crowd– as well as the lives of those who live there, no matter how minor.

Lunch

City Dreamer

Subway

Don’t Look at Me

Late Night Snack

Mavis Li

My artwork explores the experience of moving from China to the United States, capturing the journey of meeting and adapting to two cultures. In my artwork, I blend traditional elements and painting styles from the East and West, using symbols such as Western oil paintings and traditional Chinese ink paintings to reflect the coexistence of these cultures. My work often incorporates traditional Chinese motifs blended with contemporary Western influences to express the challenge and beauty of cultural fusion.

Harmony of Faiths

Drifting Between Worlds

Lotus Duality

Water Duality

Lotus and Lace

Lindsey Yared

How do the human senses represent my culture? My SI explores how sensory experiences—taste, touch, sight, smell, and sound—connect to my Chinese heritage. I created symbolic objects, such as a takeout box with chopsticks and a fortune cookie, a Chinese hand fan, a koi fish yin-yang, an eye reflecting a Chinese landscape, a pipa, an incense holder, and a dragon, to show how culture is perceived through the senses. Each piece highlights how traditions are felt, heard, seen, smelled, or tasted, deepening cultural identity.

Eating In

Hand Fan

Sivi Ward

My sustained investigation is about my fear of birds and how I express that through my art. I love working with charcoal because it creates dark, intense contrasts that make my pieces feel more dramatic, but it’s also forgiving, letting me experiment and refine my work. You can see this in all my pieces, where the rough textures and deep shadows help show the tension and unease I feel about birds.

A Birdhouse

Overshadow

The Origin

Go Away

Kaitlyn Wilcke

“How can I make studying for my biology class easier?” This is how my SI began. In my biology class, I studied different animals and the specific characteristics that let them survive and evolve. While studying these animals, I wanted to convey their characteristics in a more simple, relatable way. But what is more relatable than the human being itself? My SI explores the question of “ How do animals’ characteristics represent themselves through human actions?” I aim to show the unique characteristics of animals by showing how those traits would be represented through human actions.

Watching Paint Dry

Acoustic Bird

Herbivoric Rabbit

Water Works

Isabella Hansston

My artwork explores the emotional journey of my move from California to Florida, capturing the feelings of transition, fragility, and self-discovery. Using materials like cardboard, puzzle pieces, and layered textures, I convey the challenges of uprooting and adapting to a new environment. Through a mix of realism and abstraction, my work reflects the vulnerability of change while also embracing resilience and growth.

Broken Pieces

Monterey Car Week

Mindsets of Moving

Paige Kaplan

My artwork explores the themes of motherhood, care, and nature. I use warm yellows to show love and comfort, while dark colors reflect dangers of the outside world and the unknown. Through these contrasts, I try to show how motherhood and nature are linked and how they both bring light and safety into our lives.

Eternal Womb

Gold Glass Barrier

Growing Hope

Safe Embrace

Giving Glow

Cara Mortimer

I have always loved stained glass works, especially those found in my local art museum. These pieces, by Louis Comfort Tiffany, invoke a sense of serenity and beauty, making the atmosphere at the museum stand out to me. I was directly inspired by Door panels, the first piece I saw when I entered the museum. While I have worked with stained glass before, my preferred medium is clay. How can I transcend elements of stained glass into my pottery as well as embody the emotions I feel in my local art museum?

Flower Luminary

Lilies

Jennifer Li

My art depends honestly on what I am currently into. I learned a lot about impressionism, art nouveau, and realism this year, so I drew a lot of inspiration from them. I like my art to be more realistic, but I also like to experiment once in a while. I would like to work on my anatomy, observation and pencil drawing skills in the future.

Flowers

I Want Candy

Sadness

Self-Portrait in a Qi-Pao

Grey Roses

Ava Luther

In my work, I explore the connection people have to music by using color to translate sound into visual form, capturing the way music affects people on an emotional level. The color choice in my pieces reflects the mood and energy of different musical experiences. I have used many different mediums, including a record, to capture a physical representation of music.

Concert Record

Music Choice

I Hear It

Melody Bloom

Harmony at the Table

Kenza Laassel

These pieces speak a lot about my passion and interest in music. I’ve always been well-rounded in music, but using those artistic elements and applying them to physical art was challenging. I explored my diverse music interests through 2-D art to make vibrant art that exhibits the stark contrasts between rap, country, R&B, jazz, and more.

A$AP Rocky Jazz

Kanye West

Jason Aldean

Frank Ocean

Ella Mitchell

How can coral-inspired textures and forms be reimagined into functional pottery? My SI explored a balance between organic beauty and practicality, taking inspiration from the coral structures I encountered during the time I spent in St. Maarten during the summers while I was growing up. While on my grandpa’s boat, I would go snorkeling and be fascinated by all the different shapes. My wheel-thrown vase, for example, emulates brain coral with the carving method I used on it. Even though coral is very rough and imperfect, its colors and finishes make each one unique.

Tube Coral

Nautilus

Jazlyn Rosario

My art borrows a lot from the horror genre. I love taking realism and twisting it slightly to create a sense of unease, stretching proportions and manipulating different types of composition. I feel that my art is a unique way for me to express myself; what I can’t communicate with words I do with art. My favorite subject to draw is hands. I believe that from just the hands, one can observe a lot about people’s emotions and intentions. In the future, I hope to improve my understanding of human anatomy for myself and my art.

XRay

Tearing Myself Down

Hands

Katia Lyakh

The world around us is constantly moving and evolving. My artwork aims to catch a moment in time, while also focusing on themes of surrealism. The pieces attempt to connect with the feelings that stem from the world around, whether paranoia or death. I find inspiration from my own personal life and translate it onto a canvas with my chosen medium. As an artist, I aim to make my pieces accessible to a general audience, but most importantly, to make the audience think.

Disinte-grapetion

Lauren Hayes

My portfolio is inspired by my changing dreams and aspirations as I grow up. My biggest goal for this year was to try a new technique for every piece. Over these months, I’ve gotten to experiment with oil paint, collage, wax, cyanotype, printmaking, and clay. I also wanted to create a portfolio that felt bright and used lots of different colors to best illustrate my vivid dreams.

All My Days

Fruits of My Labor

Happy By Myself

Trapped Dreams

Best Friends

Samantha Rambeau

My art takes a lot from my life experiences. I find that after I illustrate moments in my life, I gain a new understanding of those memories. While making art, I prioritize planning the composition as I want my art not just to be meaningful, but also to possess a harmonious aesthetic. I like exploring ideas such as my cultural identity and surrealism in my work.

Dissecting My Gender

Still Invalid

Who Have You Become

Breaking News, I Don’t Exist!

Riya Chandra

This year art has given me a space to explore emotions I never had words for, pushing me to experiment not just with materials but with understanding myself. Inspired by surrealism, Banksy, and Basquiat, I used something besides words— stitched fabric, wax-sealed tea leaves, cyanotype figures— to symbolically capture the chaos of uncertainty, identity, and change. As I explored my fears and feelings of moving onto the next stage in my life (college), each piece helped me sit with discomfort, turning it into something meaningful.

Anonymous

Stand Out

Too Many Options

Wannabe Prophet

Held By the Seams

Raymond Pini

I tend to do digital artwork inspired by the games I play. I’ve recently been doing a lot of art based on Pokemon. I also like to use vibrant colors with a more abstract art style.

Arch Rain

Ice Spinner

That Guy Trading Cards

Dog

Sallee Rosen

My artwork explores the evolving role of women in society, using mixed media to highlight historical and cultural shifts. I enjoy working with collage, painting, and unconventional materials, such as fabric and handwritten text, to create layered narratives that challenge traditional perspectives. Through my work, I aim to spark conversations about gender, identity, and societal expectations, blending past and present to reimagine how women’s stories are told.

Bubbles

Love Letter

Man Eater

Stars and Stripes

Housewife

Addison Burgos

Movies often use setting to tell a story with more than dialogue. I want to investigate how to convey the emotions that draw people in to escape their reality. My inquiry is how, as a photographer, can the setting, lighting, and color further convey emotions, getting the audience to feel these emotions?

I experimented with different mediums, such as fabric, paint, paper, etc to create engaging compositions and designs. A lot of my ideas would never work on the first try and would take a lot of reshooting and workshopping with photoshop. I also tried different editing techniques: diptych, lighting, & coloration. My revision was based on composition, lighting, and colors. When I felt like the emotions were not reading as strongly as I wanted, I used advice from my classmates to change aspects of the photo to generate more vivid emotions.