Bright colors and captivating images bring furniture to life for the art department’s silent auction. Art students transformed plain cabinets and tables into works of art for the auction being held to raise money for art supplies.

The process began in late October when art teacher Mary Marinel assigned her fourth and fifth period art classes to form groups, pick out a piece of furniture and artistically transform it. The idea came from an AP workshop she attended where she met another teacher who had done a similar fundraiser at her school.

Students worked on furniture that had been donated by parents, staff and members of the community throughout the year. The majority of pieces had to be sanded down to remove old finishes before they could be painted with acrylics and then glazed.

“I’m very proud of the students for learning how to work on a different kind of medium, how to sand and clean up old furniture,” Marinel said.

Apart from working with the new medium, painting various images on the furniture taught students techniques such as using different sized brushes and shading for depth. Juniors Angelica Rivera and Jaime Conrad designed a small cabinet with the thought of making something they would like to have for themselves.

“When we picked out the furniture, I fell in love with [the cabinet],” Rivera said.

The auction debuted at the Winter Fest on Saturday, Jan. 31, and one-half of the pieces acquired starting bids. All pieces will be on display in the front office and taking bids until Feb. 2.

Featured Furniture

“We liked the table because of the shape- the arches, the tiers, and the glass. We started with a couple of ideas. We wanted to do a map and it was inspired by Middle Earth from the Lord of the Rings.”

“When we picked out the furniture, I fell in love with the box. We spent a good two weeks on it, we painted it white and did all the flowers, and then the last thing was the storm on the inside.” Angelica Rivera said.

“We wanted something big with bold shapes so it wouldn’t be too complicated, but it would also be bold.” Trey Tucker said.

“We have a lot of different things that we like to draw, and we couldn’t decide how to design it, so we thought we’d put a collage of different things on the furniture. We started with pencil, and then we started painting it.” senior Laura Mickler said.

“First we had to sand the chair down because it had original paint and tarnish on it, and then after we sanded it down, we drew the picture of the sunset and we painted it.” senior Brandon Miner said.

“For our table, we took neon colors and a palate knife and we spread it down to make it look like the northern lights, and then we took a toothbrush and we flicked it to make nice little stars and comets across our sky.” sophomore Porsha Martin said.

6 item(s)