art judge

I was the ArtWorks 2024 Judge for the Sioux City Community School District

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On May 2, 2024, I was honored to serve as the ArtWorks 2024 judge for the Sioux City Community School District. This was a massive show with 1,000 student pieces from elementary, middle, and high school students! It was a lot of fun to soak in all of the varied artwork on display, and it was very difficult to award only ten prize placements. I was really wowed by the students’ hard work and talent, and also by the teachers’ creative assignments and support!

I returned that evening to see the show’s opening night, and it was packed with admiring folks of all ages. Here are a few photos of parts of the exhibition - it was so big that these only capture a portion of it!

"Art Under Review" Regional High School Exhibition Judge

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The head art teacher for the Sioux City Community School District reached out to me last year and asked if we would be willing to host a competitive art show in Morningside’s Eppley Art Gallery for three regional high schools’ artists: North, East, and West High Schools. Each high school’s art teacher would select the entries, and then I was asked to judge the pieces and award prizes as well as provide a critique of the artwork for the students.

I enthusiastically agreed! The show, Art Under Review, has been on exhibition in Eppley Art Gallery from the beginning of the spring semester on January 10. I will be announcing awards and critique feedback on January 31. The visiting student artists will also get to attend an art workshop and take a campus tour. The show will continue through February 2, 2024.

Judging the Sioux City Camera Club Print Competition

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I was invited to serve as a judge for the Sioux City Camera Club’s print competition in mid-October, and it was a really fun experience! The competition was split into two parts: color, and black and white. I along with two other judges rated each entry on technical skill, composition, and interest. I was quite impressed with the quality of the submissions - we have some really talented photographers in our community! Category winners will go on to compete further on a regional level, so I’ll be interested to hear how those photos fare in upcoming competitions.

Judging-wise, I have a lot of experience in assessing artwork in terms of value, color, composition, and so on. I am also expert at Adobe Photoshop, so digital manipulation is totally in my wheelhouse. I am skilled at digital photography, but there’s more there that I’d like to learn, and in film photography I know the basics but haven’t immersed myself in that discipline since undergrad. It was interesting to see how my deep knowledge areas complemented those of the other judges and vice versa.