A little boy running around the track, his shadow trailing behind. A realistic, observation sculpture of a stick, made out of wire, clay, and acrylic paint.
AP art student seniors Grace Bonacum and Amber Ellis constructed these pieces for their portfolios. Next year, Ellis will attend the School of the Art Institute in Chicago, and Bonacum will attend Massachusetts College of Art and Design in Boston.
“I think I originally ended up getting super into art because my parents made the mistake of letting me watch Sailor Moon instead of making friends [when I was younger], so I just stayed home for a few years and painted watercolors of Sailor Moon instead of developing social skills or going outside ever,” Ellis said.
Bonacum said she always knew she wanted to do something art related and has always enjoyed creating things and viewing different types of art. She applied to ten schools; eight were exclusively art schools and two were art programs within a university.
“Art class and art in general is always a good time,” Bonacum said. “You get to do what you want.”
AP Art teacher Gillian Bailey said Bonacum is a wonderfully creative art student who works hard to make her vision of the artwork come to life. Though the creative process can be frustrating, Bailey said, Bonacum always takes things in stride.
Ellis realized that art school was a realistic option for her when she attended The Oxbow School, a boarding school in Napa from August to December 2011.
“A few months ago, I fully finally accepted that I couldn’t easily see myself in a non-arts focused environment,” Ellis said. “Art school really made the most sense in the scheme of where I wanted to be.”
Ellis applied to nine schools; three being strictly art schools and six liberal art schools.
“My favorite part of art overall is the vast and various selection of opportunities it provides me with continually in all sorts of situations,” Ellis said. “It gives me a constant, yet appropriately shifting, skill set in everyday life.”
Bailey said Ellis is a very conceptual art student, and the ideas behind her work are sometimes a major part of the work itself. Pushing the boundaries of her ideas is a strong point of Ellis’s, Bailey said.
Ellis’s two main role models when she was younger were her neighbor and her babysitter. Her neighbor had a ceramics studio with a kiln and was always a huge supporter of Ellis’s art. Her babysitter, who recently graduated from Rhode Island School of Design, would draw with her and her siblings.
Both Ellis and Bonacum are in AP art, their fourth year with teacher Gillian Bailey.
“Ms. Bailey has taught me an innumerable amount and I definitely wouldn’t have gotten into schools as smoothly without her help,” Ellis said. “There are so many small, basic things that she taught me that really helped me and matter a very great deal when all totaled together.”
Bonacum said art class at school taught her to add more value to her art. It also taught her how to respond to critiques, but keep her art the way she envisioned it.
Bailey said being an art teaching is rewarding in so many different ways.
“To have a beginning student start the year unsure of themselves, looking overwhelmed at the blank piece of paper in front of them, and to have them experience the success of creating something that they are proud of is amazing. To hear a student say ‘I can’t believe it came out the way I wanted it to, or to see the pride on their face when their peers compliment them is rewarding,” Bailey said. “No two students, or their art-making process, are the same which makes my job different every day.”
Bailey attended CA College of the Arts straight out of high school as a printmaking major, and graduate school at University of San Francisco for a Master’s in Art Education with an emphasis in social justice. During summers she volunteered teaching art at juvenile hall with students with severe physical disabilities and interned for educational institutes at museums.
“Art majors can go into all sorts of professions,” Bailey said. “While there are standard careers such as illustration, gaming, graphic design, education, and arts administration, the main thing about art majors is that they are not necessarily defined by their major.”
Bailey said the arts teach you to have conviction in your ideas and think critically about how to solve challenges, which translates to any number of career fields and is valued by employers.
Ellis said AP art is a very supportive, fun class because each person has a unique concentration but they are all working towards the same goal: sending in their AP 2D/Drawing portfolios.
“The application was similar to non-art colleges,” Bonacum said. “I had to complete the online application, submit essays, and send in ACT scores. On top of all that, I submitted my portfolio, which took a lot of work uploading and labeling for each college.”
Bonacum said the portfolio consists of 10-20 art pieces that she has created within the last two years, varying for each college.
“Applying to art schools, as an art major at any college, or even turning in an art supplement can be a daunting task,” Bailey said. “Art III students build a website which they can use for the Common Application. However, it does seem that no two schools ever want the same thing.”
Bailey spends a lot of time with seniors in the fall organizing how to most efficiently meet the requirements for their portfolios and get them submitted properly.
Ellis said she used a website called “SlideRoom” to submit 15-20 pieces of art with the titles, measurements, and mediums listed on the thumbnail of each piece.
“The school portfolio requirements varied, but I just tried to send them what I felt was my best work,” Ellis said.
Bailey said art schools tend to be very community driven, diverse, and exciting with all of the creativity occurring. However, being an art major at a larger university can often be the same experience within the department; students have the experience of getting to know a broader student population and tend to spend most of their time with students of the same interests, but there are greater opportunities to do things like play sports or take a wider range of other courses.
