From visual, wood and ceramic arts to music, dance, tech, production, photography and more, the annual Arts Night brought to life the incredible talents of Spartan students.
Before doors opened, student artists and staff apply, last-minute organization to the “Under the Sea” gallery. As one of four different areas, The gallery, housed, visual, ceramics, wood and other art during Arts Night ‘24. (CSD Journalism class photo).
On Tuesday, December 10, 2024, hundreds of Spartan students, families and friends entered via red carpet to a school transformed into a living, magical center of galleries, performances, interactive displays and demonstrations, complete with a student created art sale.
For one winter evening each year, CSD art students share their creations from the first half of the year. Arts Night, organized by the arts department teachers and supported by CSD Spartans Arts Supporters, is called the Super Bowl of CSD arts for a very specific reason. If it is arts related, and it is awesome, it is part of Arts Night.
This year‘s theme, “Under the Surface,” encouraged students to think in the literal and the abstract about life above and below, including the sea, and what it means, and how it can be interpreted. Reflected in all the artwork, demonstrations and presentations and performances, plus even the interactive activity stations, what was present everywhere you looked was the dichotomy of harmony and conflict and right and wrong. What might appear on the surface could look entirely different below.
CSD student journalists were on hand to capture and commemorate the evening. In this photo story is a glimpse of Arts Night.
From center moving left, Bailey Rowles (‘26), Bryson Calkins (‘27), Matilda Walter (‘26), James Vale (‘27), Blake Tapia (‘25) and Tessa Fuller (‘26) open their show with a dance scene. By moving together in a circle, they showed a unity that was contrasted by the tensions in the rest of the play. (Elena Cunningham)
Wearing white, Matilda Walter(‘26) goes on the attack in battle against Evan Alcamo (‘28) during the theater performance. The lack of spoken word didn’t take away from the shades of meaning behind each scene, like the sword fighting, which was a battle for equality and freedom. (Elena Cunningham)
Bryson Calkins (‘27), Matilda Walter (‘26), and Evan Alcamo (‘28) perform in a play inspired by communicating without words. In the climax, a family turns against each other when the women decide to fight for their freedom. (Elena Cunningham)
Lorelei Carr (‘28) displays her beautifully made paper mache, paint, puffy paint and newspaper-made jellyfish. Lorelei Carr said she made a jellyfish because “the arts night theme is under the surface and I wanted to go with a literal under the surface.” Carr also said she “expresses social issues about the animals in the ocean and how we should take care of them.” Many parents and students were stopped in their tracks when they saw this beautiful piece of art. (Conner Shelton)
Life-long Buffalo Bills fan, Alex Dubois (‘25), displays a beautiful small wood replica Bills helmet. “When going about making this project I wanted to find something challenging to make,” Alex Dubois said. “This is the most challenging project I have ever made.” For the Bills logo, Dubois used a wood burner to carve it by hand. This delicate piece of wood art did not go unnoticed. Even though it is a smaller creation, it stood out from the rest. (Conner Shelton)
Isolde Phelps (‘25) created an intricate ceramic sculpture forming a tree stump with a raccoon inside. The piece is named ‘Hide-y home.’ Isolde says her message for the piece is “to always discover and look for the hidden stories in life.” She created the piece by molding a slab for the tree trunk and then hand sculpting the raccoon by scoring over it several times. (Mia Kirsch)
Kai Kato Starr (‘28) created this piece using cardboard to model a 3-D head upon a painted cardboard base. The art is an impressive sculpture out of a common media. The piece depicts a dinosaur skeleton being excavated from the dirt. “My work expresses a social issue by showing that you can hide your feelings inside you and that you need someone to help reveal those feelings,” Kia Kate Starr said. (Ben Gallagher)
Mae Koz (‘25) created this red panda from clay. “I have always been very fond of red pandas as they are the original and most intelligent panda. It is a tragedy, for they are now endangered,” Mae Koz said. It was created using an intricate process of molding the clay and pinching it to let the air out as it enters the kiln. After the kiln, the head, legs and tail had to be molded and attached to the main body. The fur-like texture came from the slip on the top. The underglaze was the final step in the process. The result was a beautiful recreation of the endangered red panda. (Ben Gallagher)
Grace Maddox (‘26) created a beautiful collage piece to send the message that “beauty comes from under the surface.” She chose the title ‘Pink and Pearl’ because pearl is the first thing your eye is drawn to and pink is the main color in this piece. Maddox developed this piece by “creating a colleague base with warm tones, predominantly pink.” (Mia Kirsch)
Gates Westmoreland (‘28), created a painting of sea life with a light blue background. In it, there is a fish and a variety of sea life and plants. Westmoreland used 3D elements like sponge and cardboard “so that my art wasn’t boring and could attract you,”Gates Westmoreland said, emphasizing how miraculous it is that this beautiful underwater life could exist. They said, “I want people to see my art and think of a coral reef and how it is crazy that God made that.” (Liam Bradley)
Amanda Moran (‘25) created a 3D structure titled the “Kindness Train” in shades of grey and black with windows, figures inside and a banner displaying the title. Originally, she wanted to make this a painting, but she changed her mind during the process. “As I was making this it started out as just a painting but then I realized that it was too simple and… didn’t fit with what I was trying to express,” Moran said in her artistic statement, seen in the middle-left of the photo. What she wanted to make was “To have a broken… train on the outside… carrying happy people on the inside…, symbolizing” how much the train cares about its passengers,” Moran said. (Liam Bradley)
Spencer Foy (‘25) created a visual representation of a ‘silent protagonist’ a character used to add more depth to a story once you are connected to the main character, furthering its impact. Foy excelled with this piece’s detail, down to the absence of the character’s mouth. The piece encourages the viewer to recognize the role silent protagonists play in themselves. (Avery Nardone)
Cooper Chandler (‘28) created a colorful painting called “Jaws Sunset,” which was inspired by the infamous summer blockbuster. “I wanted to create a scene where the shark is placed in front of a warm, peaceful sunset,” Cooper Chandler said. The painting shows the shark jumping out of the water in front of a beautiful red, orange and yellow sunset. Another goal of this piece is to “inflict a positive, calm feeling,” Chandler said. (Dylan Sherman)
Ben Stevens (‘28) created this piece called “Hidden History.” This painting shows a hidden dinosaur fossil amidst a dark and gloomy forest. “I chose a dinosaur, because it is history, and underground, because it is hidden,” Stevens said. This piece helps illustrate how history can be anywhere, it just could be “hidden history.” (Dylan Sherman)
Isabel McDavitt (‘25) created this piece called “After hours.” The painting depicts a scene of three people sitting in a cafe. McDavitt said it was intended to capture a scene of Asian-American nightlife during the mid 19th century. McDavitt also described it as “a style reminiscent of early American oil paintings, encapsulating ideas and masking something darker.” (Evan Mulligan)
Ansley Day (‘27) created this paper mache sculpture called “Sea Star.” This piece depicts a red starfish. Day was also the creator of the 3D whale at Arts Night ‘23 and utilized plaster, tape and magazines. In terms of the goal of the art, Day clarified that the intent of their art is “to be uplifting and connect with ‘under the surface’ by being a fun creature that lives under the sea,” Ansley Day said. (Evan Mulligan)
“For my piece, I was inspired by the red string theory, which is the Japanese legend where you have invisible red strings connected to all the people you’re going to meet and are meant to be in your life. I thought this was really sweet,” Mary Anne Byrd (‘26) said. “I came to the realization that I wanted to make it more personal, so for the strings that are intertwined in between the skeleton hands, I made them gold to symbolize guardian angels in my life.” (Kate Saussele)
Isolde Phelps (‘25) created this skeletal figure of a salamander, titled “Under eastern hellbender” with oil pastels, acrylic paint, cardboard, paper and lamination paper. She said that because these creatures are usually found under something, she wanted to display what’s under the salamanders themselves. The message that she hopes to convey with the piece is to look past the naked eye’s view. (Kate Saussele)
This piece, titled “Heart Bandsaw Box” was created by Zoey Ciampaglia (‘26). She used a bandsaw, tablesaw and planer to make the box. She said that making the piece was time consuming and required strong knowledge of each tool. Having completed the piece, Ciampaglia is very proud of the final product of her heart-shaped box. (Kate Saussele)
Augusta Fuhr (‘25) and Thomas Clarke (‘25) performed their song “Sunset” to kick off the songwriting portion of Arts Night. The class’ project was titled “Sunset to Sunrise.” Their performance had two vocalists singing over a track, sometimes apart and other times together. Students in the class presented original songs that correlated with times between 7 p.m. to 5 a.m. Every performance of the night had a unique take on the times they chose, genres ranging from rap to acoustic. (Kate Saussele)
Jack Sullivan (‘25) created a visual art piece that blended his two big life passions, God and basketball. Using color pencils he drew a sketch of Jesus and a cross to represent something he holds to his heart and then proceeded to draw two of the NBA’s biggest stars, Jalen Brunson and Anthony Edwards, to show his connection to the game that he loves. (Brandon Amaya)
Elena Cunningham is a sophomore in her second year at CSD. She spent her first year learning and growing in Creative Writing class and is excited to explore a new area of writing. She has loved reading (especially fiction) even longer than writing and her favorite book is The Outsiders for its characters and their dynamic relationships. A recent favorite is also the layered storyline of Divine Rivals by Rebecca Ross.
Elena also spends a large portion of time playing volleyball. She has bounced around positions since starting high school, mostly playing as a middle blocker (despite being 5’3”), and she loves changing positions because she is constantly learning new aspects of the game.
Quote -
“Always try to be a little kinder than is necessary”
-J.M. Barrie
Walk-up Song?
“Hall of Fame”
-The Script
Conner Shelton is a CSD senior who is returning for his third year of Journalism. Conner loves all things sports, so you will typically find his work in the sports section of the Spartan Sentinel. The ultimate goal that Conner has in mind is to become a sports broadcaster once he graduates. He wants to be just like his favorite sports broadcaster, Kirk Herbstreit. Conner has always enjoyed writing more than reading, so Journalism has been such a great fit for him over the past three years.
Conner loves to spend his time playing baseball and piano. Fun fact, he has actually been playing the piano since he was five years old. You will typically find him outdoors hanging out with his dog, Charley. He loves to watch all sporting events and will most likely catch at least every single day.
Additionally, Conner has a younger sister named Carsyn who is in 8th grade and has been at CSD her whole life. Food is one of Conner’s favorite things in the whole world, and he especially enjoys any kind of pasta. Conner is excited for his senior year and for the opportunity to produce more sports content throughout the year.
Quote?
"Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for the LORD your God is with you wherever you go."
-Joshua 1:9
Walk-up Song?
“Cowgirls”
-Morgan Wallen
Mia Kirsch is a senior who is in her first year both at CSD and in Journalism. Mia hopes to take the lessons she learns and apply them to a future career in the fashion industry. She is looking forward to writing creative stories about fashion, music and student life.
Mia likes to spend her free time listening to music, spending time with her friends and watching television. Mia’s favorite show is Gilmore Girls because of its witty humor and comforting fall energy. Her favorite activity to do with her friends is thrifting vintage clothing. Mia started dancing at age three, took a break from it, and is taking dance classes for fun this year.
Quote?
“I’m just being dramatic it's what I do”
-Lorelai Gilmore
Walk-up Song?
“Overprotected”
-Britney Spears
Ben Gallagher is a senior who has been attending CSD since eighth grade. He is looking forward to his fourth and final year as a part of the Journalism team and hopes it’s the best year yet. This year in the class, he wants to branch out from the usual stories he writes and explore styles such as opinion pieces, podcasts and photo stories.
When not at school, Ben is often found on the sports field. Baseball and recently football take up the majority of his calendar and he loves it. On the diamond he plays middle infield and outfield while in football he plays receiver and free safety.
Outside of school, Ben enjoys reading, hanging out with friends, eating food and spending time outdoors. His favorite books are The Count of Monte Cristo and The Hobbit. His mom’s lasagna is his favorite food.
Quote?
“Put on the full armor of God that you may withstand the schemes of the Devil.”
-Ephesians 6:11
Walk-up Song?
“Can’t tell It All (Remix)”
-Hulvey, KB, and Lecrae
Liam Bradley is a CSD senior who hopes to build a portfolio of written work both to follow up his freshman year in Journalism I and to contribute to the school’s online news site.
In his spare time, Liam plays the drums, works out, sleeps and watches classic films. Interesting, fun and unique about Liam is that he, as a senior, is not at school very much and gets dismissed pretty early.
If Liam Bradley could interview one person, it would be Christopher Morris, the creator of the show Brass Eye. Liam respects Morris’ work and is enticed by the challenge of interviewing a somewhat reclusive celebrity.
Quote?
“I will not make any deals with you. I've resigned. I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed or numbered. My life is my own.”
-’Number Six’ from the TV show The Prisoner.
Walk-up Song?
“Good Times Bad Times”
-Led Zeppelin
Evan Mulligan is an eleventh-grade student who started at the Community School of Davidson (CSD) in ninth grade. Evan has been participating in Journalism class for three years and sees this as a stepping stone to continue the study in college. He has a passion for politics and foreign policy and writes about these topics on both the Spartan Sentinel and his own blog.
Evan is passionate about Model United Nations and has participated in several conferences in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, and Washington D.C., as a member of CSD’s Model UN club.
Outside of school, Evan enjoys going on walks in the woods and listening to ABBA in his free time.
Quote?
“The greatest good you can do for another is not just share your riches, but to reveal to him his own.”
-Benjamin Disraeli
Walk-up Song?
”Summer Night City”
-ABBA
Kate Saussele, Deputy Editor-in-Chief, Features Editor
Kate Saussele is a senior in her second year at CSD. She has participated in journalism outside of school, but this is her first year as an official staff member of the Spartan Sentinel. In her writing, she enjoys exploring the intersection of entertainment, science and aspects of human interest.
Over the summer, Kate was accepted into Boston University’s Summer Journalism Academy and had the opportunity to publish two articles she wrote during the program in their online newspaper, The Terrier. While in the city, she also explored the greater Boston area and met other like-minded journalists from all over the country.
At CSD, Kate is president of the Women in STEM club and is a member of Model UN. She hopes that what she learns in the Journalism class will help her make an impact in a future career.
Outside of school, Kate enjoys playing piano and guitar, antique shopping and taking day trips with friends. She also loves to rewatch 10 Things I Hate About You, scroll through Pinterest and decorate her room.
Quote?
“Live your life with arms wide open; today is where your book begins, the rest is still unwritten”
-Natasha Bedingfield, Unwritten
Walk-up Song?
“One Way or Another”
-Blondie
Brandon Amaya is a CSD senior. He attended CSD high school for his first two years but then moved to Florida for his junior year because of his mom’s job and is now back for his final year. He took Journalism in his sophomore year and is now back again. Brandon hopes to use the class as a way to expand and sharpen his writing skills. He hopes to pursue a career in sports journalism and wants to know more about the different styles of writing and media.
Brandon enjoys playing basketball and his favorite team is the Chicago Bulls. One of his favorite foods is pizza, specifically deep dish from Chicago. He also enjoys hanging out with friends and watching movies whether comedy, action or drama. Two of his favorite movies are Knives Out and DUNE (Part Two).
“Some people want it to happen, some wish it would happen, others make it happen.”
-Michael Jordan
Walk-up Song?
“24k Magic”
-Bruno Mars
Avery Nardone is a junior in her second year at CSD and first year in Journalism who hopes to explore the art of writing and media in the course. She dreams of experiencing as much of the world as possible and wants to capture it through writing.
On top of classes, Avery practices diving eight times a week but on the rare occasion she has free time she’s running, playing pickleball or reading. Her friends are very important to her and they enjoy going to Chili’s, road tripping and exploring new places. Traveling and adventures are something she would feel incomplete without.
Quote?
“To define is to limit”
-Oscar Wilde
Walk-up Song?
“You are the right one”
-Sports
Dylan Sherman is a new CSD freshman. He moved to North Carolina from Connecticut in 2019 and has enjoyed living in North Carolina. He is new to Journalism and joined because of his love of sports and writing about them. This opportunity is a new chance for him to get to write about what he loves to do. He also wants to be a student journalist because he describes himself as being creative.
This year Dylan is looking forward to sports at school whether it is playing them or writing about them. He wants to go into detail both about the sports world and the school’s sports teams by writing impactful stories about different topics.
In his spare time, Dylan plays travel baseball and his main position is third base. He also enjoys traveling to new places with his family and going to the beach because of the relaxation of being on vacation. When he has the time, he likes to play video games with his friends. If he was not at school he would be at the beach or doing something sports related.
Quote?
“Once you know what failure feels like, determination chases success.”
-Kobe Bryant
Walk-up Song?
“For Sure”
-Future Islands
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