MHS Students Participate in Congressional Shows, Win Awards

Twelve Millburn High School art students participated in An Artistic Discovery, a nation-wide high school arts competition sponsored by U.S. House of Representatives members.

Each Congressional District hosts the yearly competition for the high school students living in their district. The 10th Congressional District event and show was held at the Newark Art Museum, and the 11th Congressional District event, which was sponsored by Novartis Pharmaceuticals, was held at the Morris Museum in Morristown.

This year's participants in the 10th Congressional District competition included sophomores Chelsea Castro, Jake Oleson, and Wenyun Zou, Juniors, Yaou Duan and Candice Whitney and seniors Adrianna Kim, Joy Jeong and Maren Less. The students participating in the 11th Congressional District competition included freshman Dana Surruto and Sona Roy and sophomores Chanthia Ma and Jordan Scharf.

The students' work is first juried at the high school to determine what pieces will be submitted to the competitions. Once the work is in the show, professional artists jury the art and awards are determined. Four of the works in this year's competitions received awards.  At the 10th Congressional District Award Ceremony Jake Oleson won second place for his collage, Joy Jeong won second place for her hand-tinted linocut print and Candice Whitney won first place in Mixed Media and second place in Overall Show for her embroidered self-portrait. At the 11th Congressional District Award Ceremony, Chanthia Ma won honorable mention for her self-portrait created in oil paint.

The students' work was created in a variety of classes including Honors Art taught by Mary Weber, Honors Crafts taught by Diane Benjamin, Digital Art and Design taught by Susan Bromirski and AP Studio Art I and II and Art Consortium taught by Kathleen Harte Gilsenan.