April 25 – May 19

Fremont High School senior Danielle Chan won “Best in Show” and a $5,000 scholarship award Thursday evening, April 25 at the second annual Santa Clara County-Wide High School Art Exhibition sponsored by The Museums of Los Gatos.  Awards were presented at the exhibit’s opening reception held at the Museum.  Her winning piece, titled The Future is Encrypted, was selected from 70 artworks juried into the show from 450 submissions.

The exhibition theme of this second annual competition, “Art+Tech+Culture” asked student artists to visually communicate their perspectives about the impact of technology in their lives. A total of $10,000 in professional development scholarships and gift certificates were awarded by the Museums.

In addition to “Best in Show,” thirteen winners shared $5,000 in awards that included first and second place winners in six categories: painting, photography, drawing and prints, mixed media, new media and 3D-sculpture and ceramics. A “People’s Choice” award was determined by public voting online through the Museum’s Facebook page and in person. Congratulations to Connor Church!

The Museums received entries from students representing 23 Santa Clara county high schools.  A panel of three jurors selected the 70 works exhibited.  The jurors, all artist/educators, were: Kenny Mencher, Professor of Art at Ohlone College, Lynn Powers, artist and former Lecturer at San Jose State University and James Morgan, Instructor in Digital Media, San Jose State University and Director of Ars Virtua.

Community sponsors of the exhibition are:  The Mike and Alyce Parsons Foundation; University Art; Heritage Bank; Del Grande Auto Group; Saratoga Rotary; Los Gatos Morning Rotary, The Waitte Foundation.

“The Museum is proud to host such an impressive group of talented artists in an ever expanding circle of Santa Clara Valley high Schools,” states Museum Director John Agg.  “The quality of work and the variety of creative ideas and media was everything one could have wanted, congratulations.”

Adds juror James Morgan,  “I have been teaching digital media art for six years now and worked in the space for another decade. I was impressed by the quality and variety of works that were submitted.  We were faced with difficult decisions in the jurying process because of the skill, content, and the experimental and expressive nature of the work presented.”

Next year’s exhibition theme and dates will be announced early September 2013.

The winners by category are:

Painting:
1st place: Connor Church, Homestead High School
2nd place: Stephany Sanchez-Perez, Del Mar High School

Photography:
1st place:  Elizabeth Fuchs, Los Altos High School
2nd place: Fiona Stolorz, Los Altos High School

Drawing & Prints:
1st place:  Gabriela Taccir, Leigh High School
2nd place:  Freja Mickos, Los Altos High School

Sculpture/Ceramics:
1st place: Alissa Wilson, Ann Sobrato High School
2nd place: Taylor Groves, Homestead High School

Mixed Media:
1st place: Samir Kothari, Palo Alto High School
2nd place: Chaieun Lee, Westmont High School

New Media
1st place:  Phoenix Suranofsky, Westmont High School
2nd place:  Catherine Huang, Homestead High School