Student Art League fosters creativity
By: Abigail Nawrot
Sports Editor
Student Art League is a Hudson Valley Community College club that promotes community and artistic growth.
AJ Jones, fine arts major, who has been attending Hudson Valley Community College for 7 years, is a long-time member of Student Art League.
“It’s set up where we do a meeting and then a couple subcommittee meetings for things we’re interested in and random paperwork that we need to bring to students,” Jones said. “We’ll get everyone together for a serious business talk maybe about once a month and then organize larger gatherings.”
David Autid, fine arts major, and treasurer of Art League, said the club has a strong and involved community.
“Many of the members there have been here for years and years, and the reason we’re all [in Student Art League] is because we want to learn more about [art],” said Autid. “We don’t meet up a lot, but we’re all pretty close.”
“We’ll do game nights, we publish an [Art Club Zine] every semester [sic] to do outreach and also just to gather the studio culture.” Jones said.
Jones said despite the fact that Student Art League is a smaller club and a certain demographic tends to lean towards it, the group is very accepting of students outside of the program.
“One of the things about the Fine Arts Program is we almost have a graduate program [sic] where once you finish the two-year Fine Arts Program, you can stay for an extra year of advanced drawing and painting,” Jones said. “Those are typically the sort of students that gravitate towards Art League.”
Jones continued, “We do occasionally get people in from digital media majors, or more from intro drawing and painting classes, photo classes, etc.”
Beyond building a strong social bond between like-minded peers, Student Art League helps further artistic education outside the walls of Hudson Valley Community College by visiting art museums.
Joseph Intierie, a fine arts major, says the different museums give him perspective and greater diversity in terms of art.
“Seeing the end result is very satisfying, and that’s one of the best parts of visiting museums,” said Intierie. “I look at the pieces in the museums we visit, and try to think what is successful, and how I can implement that in my own artistic renderings.”
Not only does visiting museums assist art students with being more creative, it helps them with technique.
Secretary of Student Art League and fine arts major, Zoe Catiling, says visiting museums allows her to challenge her art skills.
“It gives me a chance to get more into color,” said Catiling. “Color is what I have the hardest time with, it’s so complex, and getting to go to museums where I can see how it is implemented in quality pieces is a great opportunity for me to think outside the box.”
For any students interested in furthering their art experience, Student Art League is a great place to start.