St Andrew’s Anglican College has celebrated 20 years of Visual Art, with the opening of its biggest Visual Arts Exhibition in the College’s history.
The two-storey Learning Hub will transform into a professional Art Gallery, featuring artwork from students in the Early Learning Centre all the way through to Year 12 major artworks, some of which will go on to feature at GOMA next year.
From humble beginnings of Art Exhibitions held in Science Classrooms, Head of Visual Art, Ben Hedstrom said he was proud to have grown the Visual Arts Exhibition to be a professional quality event to showcase student creativity.
With subject enrolments and co-curricular involvement in Visual Arts at an all-time high this year, it is testament to the growth and demand for the high-quality programs and world-class experiences offered at the College.
“My focus has been to create a love for Visual Art and an enduring place for Visual Art culture in the psyche of our community,” he said.
“Over the years, we have seen Visual Art at St Andrew’s grow into a valued part of the culture and life of the College, student body and community,” he said.
“We set out with a vision to ‘redefine Visual Art education and provide world-class opportunities and outcomes for our students’ and I’m delighted to say that at our 20th year anniversary we are well on our way to achieving this vision.”
Since 2016, St Andrew’s has had seven students feature as Creative Generation Excellence Award Winners at the prestigious exhibition held at QAGOMA in Brisbane, including current Year 12 student Sophie Armstrong-Wearne.
Other success highlights from over the years include students achieving 100 per cent in Visual Art (under the ATAR system) and being awarded Top in the State in Visual Art, students awarded significant Visual Arts Scholarships, students winning regional Art awards and many going on to become professional practising artists and creative professionals in a variety of industries.
Key to this growth and success over the past 20 years, Mr Hedstrom believes is relationships.
“At St Andrew’s we often say that our strength of relationships is what sets us apart. Visual Art at St Andrew’s is no different,” he said.
“We pride ourselves on cultivating excellent relationships with our students, so we can lead them to the deepest levels of learning engagement and the highest possible outcomes. We strive to connect with the Visual Art community and the broader community to bring real-world learning experiences and opportunities to our students and our student’s artwork to the world.”
Looking to the next 20 years with a mindset of continued growth and improvement the College’s next major undertaking will be researching and developing a plan for a Future Learning Precinct/STEAM centre – to provide an expansion of world-class facilities to support Visual Art programs for future generations.
This year, the Visual Arts Exhibition will be judged by Sunshine Coast Artists Libby Derham and Petalia Humphries. Both Libby and Petalia are prominent and respected members of the Sunshine Coast visual art community as well as former Visual Art teachers at the College
The Visual Arts Exhibition opened on Friday 13 October, in the Learning Hub with the official opening night and awards ceremony, at St Andrew’s Anglican College. Get in quick as it’s only open to view from 3.30pm to 5pm until Friday 20 October.
