As spring season approaches, art students are given the opportunity to participate in the VASE competition, or Visual Arts and Scholastic Event, which encompasses both regional and state-level rounds. On March 1, the VASE competition was hosted at Independence High School where students’ interviews and art showcases took place.
Kicking off the competition in regionals, students strive to advance their artwork to the next levels of the competition.
“[Students] have an opportunity to earn a medal at regional, and then there’s also an opportunity to advance to state and get something called a Gold Seal,” the art teacher Cheyenne Wilson said. “[Jurors] pick the best of the best work based off of a rubric, and only 150 people in the state get that.”
Over the past few years, the VASE competition has gained more attention from students, and this gave the art teachers a new challenge for this year’s VASE.
“We are taking the most artwork [submissions] that we’ve ever taken,” Wilson said. “We’re taking 91 artworks between the three teachers this year, and I’m taking 57 of them. So, I think the challenge is making sure everybody’s [artwork] is right … and ready to go.”
Even though every year presents a new experience and unexpected challenges throughout the competition, students are filled with confidence and excitement to enter this year’s VASE.
“I think this year’s VASE is going to be the best one yet, because each year the school’s growing,” Krithik Aggarwal, 11, said. “More people can submit to VASE, so more chances for our school to have its name in the state. Also, Ms. Wilson has pushed us a lot this year, and she’s pushed a lot of people to submit to VASE.”
However, the process of completing an artwork and participating in the competition is not an easy task. It comes with a huge amount of diligence, as well as forces students to undertake a challenging endeavor.
“One of the biggest challenges was time commitment, … and with high school being the roller coaster, time was a limited resource,” Aggarwal said. “So, I had to work on my detail and speed my process up… making sure you’re not perfecting each detail. Because at the end of the day, the viewer is going to see [differently from] the artist’s eyes and perspective.”
Although the process might be overwhelming, it also offers students the chance to improve their art skills through the competition experience.
“Seeing all the other artists’ work inspired me to branch out into different areas,” Agape Lawrence, 12, said. “I submitted a piece that was mainly black and white my sophomore year, but once I saw all the colors and expressions within the competition, that made my art style expand out.”
Among various aspects of the competition, the juror interview serves as a significant portion of the judging criteria.
“One thing that I really like about VASE is that it gives students the opportunity to talk to somebody about their art that’s not just their teachers,” Wilson said. “Students get really comfortable talking to their teachers and people that they know about their artwork, but it forces them into a situation [where they] might not be super comfortable.”
Entering artwork into the competition might be rewarding, but students could also encounter rejections. However, students understand that the rejections only further themselves as an artist, rather than viewing them with disappointment.
“No matter how good you think your art is or how bad you think your art is, it’s a good experience to just make art for yourself and then enter it into a competition,” Lawrence said. “So, [the most important thing is to] make art for yourself and see how far it goes.”
