Students Displaying 'Passion to Create' at Community Center Art Festival

The lobby and auditorium both resembled standing rooms Tuesday night during the jam-packed opening ceremony for the Fair Lawn Schools Art Festival.

Artwork created by students from all nine borough public schools was celebrated. The work—including crayon and marker drawings, paintings, photography, origami, ceramics, glasswork and sculpture—is on display at 10-10 20th St. through Friday.

Everyone from parents to teachers agreed that the event was well-organized.

“This is great,” Fair Lawn resident Leslie Scheinzeit said as she took a look around the lobby. Her nephew, 7-year-old second grader Sam Gross, is one of the younger students whose artwork is on display. “I’m very proud of [Sam],” added Scheinzeit.

Art teacher Kenji Yamashito, who teaches both middle and high school students, echoed Scheinzeit’s sentiment.

“I’m really proud of all my students,” he said. “They’re all very hardworking kids.”

The talent of Yamashito's students was showcased in a variety of photographs, intricate origami sculptures, and drawings that he had arranged on one display. Caught short on time, the display didn’t come out the way Yamashito had originally thought it would, “but it still looks good,” he admitted.

Yamashito teaches his high school photography students using a mixture of props, splitting them up into lessons.

“We’ll be doing [units on] flowers, musical instruments, [and] even glasswork,” he explained. He also teaches both middle and high school students how to master the art of origami, or Japanese paper folding.

“These are from kids at [],” Yamashito said as he pointed to two large origami birds hanging from the ceiling above his head; the birds were created by seventh graders. Soon, Yamashito is going to have the high school students make more origami sculptures using patriotic designs, and send them with letters to soldiers serving in Afghanistan.

“It’s going to be a good project,” Yamashito said.

As students, parents, relatives, and friends milled around the lobby viewing artwork, many of them filed into the auditorium where thespians from performed a variety of skits. From humorous sketches such as “Box Boy” and “Salon Rage” to renditions of famous plays like “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof” and “The Crucible,” the students demonstrated the talent and skill for the theater that they’ve been able to cultivate through the guidance of their teachers.

“With all the standardized tests out there, I feel like we’re testing the creativity right out of our students,” Superintendent Bruce Watson said in his opening speech to the packed auditorium. “I don’t want [these kids] to lose their passion to create.”

Watson implored parents and residents to keep these programs going by being actively involved in the upcoming school budget vote. “[Be] dedicated to keeping the arts [program] alive,” Watson said.