Art students visit the Clark Art Institute

On Thursday, November 20, the Art Department took a field trip to The Clark Art Institute in Williamstown, MA.

Students in AP Art History, AP Photography, AP Art and Advanced Art took a tour that explored the theme of Disruption and Emergence in works from the permanent collection. While in the galleries students took a close look at four different works of art, wrote poems and letters in response to those pieces and then made collages in the art studio inspired by the paintings and the themes.

About the trip, Ruth Stallard, a tenth grade student in Dr. Gravel’s AP Art History class said, “I loved going to The Clark Art Institute. Their collection was beautiful and fascinating, and the whole class was very focused and asked thoughtful questions about the art. This was one of my favorite field trips I’ve ever been on and I loved going with my class. It was a wonderful experience.”

Addison Blanchard, also in tenth grade studying Art History, commented about a specific painting. She stated, “I really liked the Women of Amphissa by Lawrence Alma-Tadema. I had seen the piece before online and had no idea it was at The Clark. I love how the artist painted the clothing and the hair of the women, and how the light was captured. It’s a big piece and there is a lot to look at and discover.”

Art students with their collages

Addison Blanchard, Nyna Lewallen and Jay Allen in the galleries

Matilda and Priscilla Richardson in the studio with their collages.

After lunch, students had time to explore The Clark’s collection. Nyna Lewallen, a tenth grade Art History student, described the work that caught her eye when she stated, “I was most drawn to Little Dancer of Thirteen Years, by Edgar Degas. As a dancer I’ve heard so much about Degas in general, but specifically about this sculpture. The girl sculpted has a feeling of calmness and relaxation, which is a stark contrast to how intense ballet can be, and it was great to see one of the renditions of this sculpture close up.”

Marlena Farinas, a senior in Ms. Jimerson’s AP Drawing class, summed up her experience by writing, “My reaction to the Clark Art Institute’s collection was wonder. It was so beautiful and had so many different and unique pieces of art. I loved so many of the different kinds of painting and textures that were in many of the artworks.” That sentiment was echoed by Zara Paczkowski, an 11 th grade student in Ms. Piana’s Advanced Studio Art, who wrote, “I felt my experience with walking through the galleries was relaxing and provided me with the opportunity to look at a variety of historical pieces. Throughout this experience, my favorite part was looking at the statues, as I loved seeing the detail and effort they put into making such realistic art works.”

Thank you so much to The Clark Art Institute for their excellent educational programming, the bus reimbursement program and to everyone who helped make this trip possible.

Joshua Byrne with his poem "Summer Squall."

Students in the European Paintings Gallery.

Maya Sluka observing Renoir's The Bay of Naples

Area students participate in regional honors music festival

Eight students from Woodstock Union Middle & High School were accepted and performed with the Connecticut Valley Honors Music Festival this past weekend. Students gained acceptance into the festival through nomination and audition, and represented the very best middle and high school musicians from the southeastern part of the state. The festival took place Friday and Saturday, November 21st and 22nd at Brattleboro Union High School. The festival included eleven hours of intense rehearsals and a culmination performance, all while working with the regions top conductors. Izzy Gieder and Georga Reed sang with the middle school Choir, Mina Gugliotta, Anabelle Park, and Sadie Rowlee played in the middle school Jazz Band, and Lia Gugliotta, Brooke Rowlee, and Liam Wheeler played in the high school Concert Band.

This is WUHSMS' second year participating after a 13 year hiatus, and we are excited to have more participants recognized this year than last.  

Congratulations to all for representing themselves and WUHSMS with pride!

Front row - Mina Gugliotta, Anabelle Park, Georga Reed, Izzy Gieder

Middle Row - Sadie Rowleee

Top Row - Liam Wheeler, Lia Guggliotta, Brooke Rowlee

Congratulations Coach Ramsey!

View fullsize

Ramsey Worrell has been named Vermont D3 Football Coach of the Year for the 3rd year in a row. He is a wonderful representation of our school and Statewide Athletic Community.

Congrats to Coach Ramsay and to team who proudly represented WUHS at this year’s DIII championship.

The latest news from C.R.A.F.T.

CRAFT Seniors Owen Whalen, Kody Lantigne, Maya Sluka, Sadie Boulbol, Sophia Rosenbach, Brody Allen, Kaitlyn Burres and Priscilla Richardson presented at UVPTC (Upper Valley Teaching Place Collaborative) Conference. Students shared a variety of experiences they have learned from in CRAFT including Stewardship Action Projects, Immersive Semester at the King Farm, German Exchange, creating CRAFT as a non profit organization, competing in Envirothon, CRREL project, service learning projects and studies in APES. The students were articulate, showed true leadership and represented WUHSMS extremely well! The adult educators they presented to were extremely impressed by all the incredible work they have done in their school and community.

Students in Regenerative Agriculture volunteered to pass out food from the Vermont Foodbank during our monthly community distribution. VeggieVanGo distributes 2 million pounds of food annually across the state and helps feed thousands of families. 

Students in the CRAFT Immersive Semester volunteered at Sustainable Woodstock to help make window inserts that reduce home energy consumption. This program made inserts for 27 homes this year and in the past 4 years has made enough inserts to save up to 8,000 gallons of fuel oil. 

Students in Regenerative Agriculture helped plant native seeds that will be cold stratified this winter, divided in the summer and sold next fall in our native plant sale. Students planted locally foraged seeds as well as ones from local seed companies to offer over 35 native plants to the community next fall. These native plants are well adapted to our region, require less water, no pesticide or fertilizers and create habitat for our native pollinator species. They improve biodiversity, can withstand floods and drought and bring beauty wherever they are planted. 

CRAFT Immersive students have been planning for the future of the King Farm while also learning about permaculture design. During that process, students are learning about agroforestry practices and planting important native fruit and nut trees into the air pruning beds they made with the help of our garden and greenhouse manager, Abbie. Students helped plant thousands of seeds that will eventually grow into seedlings that can be planted to improve the ecological health and diversity of the forest as well as provide food for many species, including us!

Library news: Middle School Book Club reads The Lost Year

In this edition of From the Library, read about the Middle School Book Club's book The Lost Year, learn how to access to The Atlantic magazine for free, discover how the Mona Lisa vanished from our library, make time to check out the Middle School Art endangered species clay tile exhibit, discover how the Faculty/Staff Book Club immersed themselves in spycraft during their discussion of Book and Dagger and there's an event reminder for the Book Swap and Winter Party the Young Adult Diverse Books Book Club is hosting on Tuesday, December 9 during ARE time! To read more and see photos, please click here.