Ivie Drogin ‘25, Arts and Entertainment Editor 

Senior IB Artists hanging Saira Rajparia’s Art Exhibit

Photo courtesy of Ivie Drogin

February marked the start of the Senior IB and Advanced Artists’ exhibitions in the Teiger Art Gallery. The seniors, a class of eight students, are creating and exhibiting their own show with pieces that they made in their time taking IB Art. The first showcase features seniors Avery Cohen, Claire Nowak, Vivian Zhang, and Catherine Guo. After one month, the second half of the seniors, Saira Rajparia, Chloe Flores, Kaitlin Goguen-Compagnoni, and Sophie Zhou, will present their works. 

The exhibition is a culmination of two years of artwork, but the seniors have been taking art classes since at least their freshman year.  To become IB artists, all candidates must previously have taken at least one year of art at Newark Academy, but often have taken both intermediate and advanced courses in their respective fields. At the end of their sophomore year, they must apply to the IB program; only a select few are chosen to take the 2-year IB art course. 

During the next two years, students research and create art for the final exhibition. The artists must create a minimum of eight pieces to display, and must explain their artistic process in an artist’s workbook. The exhibition is worth 40% of the candidate’s final IB exam grade, while the workbook and research make up the other 60%. 

Avery Cohen ‘24, a current IB artist, says one of the hardest things about setting up the exhibition was “deciding where to put [her] work” because she has such a “personal connection to each piece.” Considering each piece is created separately, the artist must think about balance and cohesion when setting up their part of the gallery. Elements like orientation and flow factor into the artist’s decision of what pieces to include, and in what order. Avery’s exhibition displays both two- and three-dimensional artwork, so she had to think about “how to balance [the works]” to create her exhibition. Saira Rajparia ‘24, whose exhibition is primarily three-dimensional, mentioned that “[she] has to think about how to fill the walls behind [her] pieces. When [the exhibition] is only 3D, there’s nothing but blank white walls overpowering the space.” Each artist has their own style, but they must figure out how to uniquely display their pieces in similar spaces. In addition, the artists must think about how “viewers who do not have the artist’s explanation will receive the work.” Luckily, each piece is accompanied by an artist’s statement card to give the viewer an overview of the main theme of the work. However, there is a myriad of thoughts and intentions behind the creation of each piece, impossible to fit in one paragraph on a statement card. 

Claire Nowak ‘24 explained,“Each piece has a deep meaning behind it. Whether it’s a personal connection or a commentary on the world, there is no piece in the gallery that is just for decoration.” Saira added that “every [artist’s] work is so personal to them. Each piece has a hidden meaning that was the reason the artist made it. So much thought went into the exhibitions, from the concept behind the piece to the actual execution.” The incredible exhibitions are carefully curated to try and display the artists’ messages and their journeys creating art for the last 2 years.

The artists exhibiting their work should be incredibly proud of their achievements. The gallery will be showing the IB artists’ works until after spring break. So next time you are walking through the gallery to get to class, take some time to look around at all of the extraordinary artwork created by the outstanding senior IB artists.