Come and enjoy an incredible display of creativity as budding artists from 20 area high schools in Montgomery, Berks and Chester counties share their talents at Montgomery County Community College’s 10^th Annual Tri-County High School Art Exhibition and Competition in the College’s North Hall Art Gallery of the Montco Cultural Center, 16 East High Street, Pottstown.

The exhibition features an impressive array of 180 artworks in a variety of media, including oils, watercolors, ceramics, prints, sculpture and more. The exhibit opens Tuesday, Feb. 13, with an artists’ reception and awards ceremony from 5 to 7 p.m. (awards begin at 6 p.m.).  Both the reception and exhibit are free and open to the community. Convenient parking is available along High Street and in the College’s parking lot at 101 College Drive.

"The exhibit is a glimpse of the remarkable projects that area art teachers are orchestrating with their students,” said Patrick Rodgers, MCCC Galleries Director. “Now in its 10^th year, this exhibition has grown from a handful of schools to a dozen in 2018 to the 20 schools participating in this year’s show.  The current exhibit features the work of more than 150 talented high school students from as far apart as Haverford and Reading. I am always in awe of the dedication of the art teachers involved in this show as well as the imagination of their students, and I’m so glad we can celebrate all of that together in Pottstown.”

This year’s juror is Rebecca Carpenter, a fine art photographer who taught art at the elementary and high school levels for 16 years.  Her current work uses models and abandoned structures in Pennsylvania and elsewhere to create evocative and texturally rich photographs. 

Carpenter selected a number of  pieces for special recognition, including:

• Untitled drypoint etching, Hannah Woods, Upper Merion Area High School
• Human in Animal, linocut print, Yebin Adelyn Sim, The Hill School
• Memories, mixed media, Sophia Lapic, Pottsgrove High School
• Untitled, collage/mixed media/pop-up, Grace Kerschner, Governor Mifflin High School
• Illumination, mixed media, Kai Degenhardt, The Haverford School
• Untitled, Photoshop, Aimee White, Pottstown High School
• Untitled, Photoshop, Cindy Garcia Villegas, Pottstown High School
• Her Realization, Photography, Jayden Robinson, Methacton High School
• Double Exposure Hand, Digital photography, Paulina Villafana-Palmas, Plymouth Whitemarsh High School
• Skeletal Study, charcoal, Cassidy Colden, Spring-Ford Sr. High School
• I’m Baby, charcoal, Giana Crane, Owen J. Roberts High School
• To Ponder, chalk pastel, Dina Kim, Perkiomen Valley High School
• The Next Stop, Prisma and colored pencil, Kale Martin, Methacton High School
• Above the Surface, colored pencil, Yueming (Maggie) Qi, the Hill School
• 5, painting, Lucia Reeves, Springfield Township High School
• Refractions, oil on canvas, Alayna Rodner, Owen J. Roberts School District
• Diving into Childhood, gouache, Erica Dickey, Pottsgrove High School
• Wooden Gift, maple, cherry, and walnut, Talan Maury, The Haverford School
• Tea Set, white stoneware, Chad Endy, Boyertown Area Senior High
• Idyllic Struggles, Mixed media sculpture, Sara Yost, Pottsgrove High School
• Day of the Dead Liminary, laser-cut plywood and resin, Gregor Weissenberger, The Haverford School

This year’s Best in Show, a $50 award sponsored by the Pottstown Area Artists Guild, was awarded to Mia Y. Davis from Daniel Boone Area High School for the mixed media piece How You Want Me.

The exhibit will be open through March 22 but will be closed March 11-17 for spring break. The gallery hours are Monday through Thursday, 8 a.m. to 9:30 p.m., and Friday from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Closed weekends.

MCCC’s Fine Arts galleries, located at both Pottstown and Blue Bell campuses, are part of the Montco Cultural Center and host a variety of exhibitions featuring professional and student artists and artwork in an array of genres, as well as related activities, programs and lectures.

For more information about the exhibit or MCCC’s galleries, contact Galleries Director Patrick Rodgers at prodgers@mc3.edu and visit the website at mc3.edu/galleries.