SHS Art Students Explore the Dark and the Light Side

The annual AT art class installation is now on view at the Scarsdale High School Gallery. Inspired by the Queen song "The Show Must Go On," the installation was created to emphasize the natural progression of emotions, portraying happy, fairy-tale like sentiments to depression and hopelessness. In their interpretation of the lyrics, the AT art students split the gallery into two extreme spaces: one "light" and one "dark." The juxtaposition of these two contrasting emotional and visual groups sheds light on the way that people choose to view the world. Installation art, for those who aren't familiar, is a genre of three-dimensional works that are site-specific and are used to transform the space they occupy. The opportunity the AT art students have to put up an installation is one unique to Scarsdale High.

During the early stages of the installation, AT art students brainstormed ideas on how to break psychological and emotional spaces. The dark side chose to cover the walls with spikes, and created a dungeon-like setting with a black, draping ceiling. The dark side really "engulfs you in darkness" said AT student Aaron Cheng. The light side filled the room with bubbles and bright butterflies to evoke a fairy-tale like feeling. The light side was meant to evoke "nostalgia of the lightness and playfulness of childhood," explained another art student Miwa Sakulrat.

Over 160 students from all grades came to walk through the installation on its opening day. At the entrance to the exhibit, viewers choose to first go through the light, bubbly pathway to their right or the dark abyss to their left. Depending on their choice, they will either go from the pastel, bright, happy side to the spike-filled, low ceilinged, dark side or vice-versa. While students from the light side guided students through the space, the artists from the dark side became a part of the art themselves by wearing all black and putting themselves into the darkness, even playfully scaring the students who walked through the dark side!

Text by Sunny Feinstein, Photos by Lindsay Leboyer