Crookston High School played host Wednesday afternoon to 134 students from 11 schools in northwest Minnesota for the MSHSL Region 8A Visual Arts Festival. Crookston has a long, positive history and that was on display again as Crookston students as all Crookston students earned at least an “Excellent” rating. Four earned “Excellent” ratings and fourteen “Superior” ratings including eight perfect scores and three “Spotlight on the Arts” awards for best in category. Among all the schools 20 earned perfect scores, 47 “Superior” ratings, 68 “Excellent” ratings and 19 non-winners.
The “Spotlight on the Arts” award winners are Karly Resendiz for her sculpture, “Pocket Full of Posies”, Elizabeth Erdman for a quilt she made entitled “Tumbling Waves”, and Logan Johnson for a chess set and board fashioned out of three types of wood titled “Because I Could”. All three will have their pieces on display at the State Art Exhibit along with nine other students from Region 8A.
In total 42 pieces were submitted by Crookston students, with 13 students making it through the pre-judging process into the final contest in seven categories: Drawing, Painting, Sculpture, Ceramics, Crafts, Photography and 2D mixed media. The other students whose works were chosen for the final contest are Elysa Christensen, Hailey Spivey, Eliza Meyer, Adriana Isum, Hannah Street, Gina Visness, Heather Visness, Skylar Weiland, Karen Perez-Gonzalez, and Jada Dillabough.
Crookston students have also competed in several other art shows throughout the year with Skylar Weiland winning Merit in Photography from Minnesota State University Moorhead. At the Northwest Minnesota Art Exhibit Johnson earned First Place Overall with his chess set, Isum took Second Place Overall with her painting “Serenity” and Elysa Christensen won Merit (best in category) for her sculpture “Fifth Dimension”.
