THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, April 6, 1995 TAG: 9504050204
SECTION: SUFFOLK SUN PAGE: 14 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY FRANK ROBERTS, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: COURTLAND LENGTH: Medium: 64 lines
For Julian M. Palomares, ``Bad News'' turned out to be good news.
``Bad News'' is the name of his sculpture, which won first place in the Rawls Museum Arts 1995 Student Art Exhibition. Thirty-two students entered 49 works.
The theme of the Palomares piece is the senior year at high school. Depression is evident on the face created by the Windsor High School artist. An exchange student from Colombia, he is making his initial run as a sculptor.
The idea of switching from painting to sculpting came from his art instructor, Lois West.
``I felt like I had to express myself,'' he said, ``so all my feelings could stay on my work instead of my mind.''
The work shows a man, holding his head in his hands. There is a look of distress on his face, which is in a box that looks like a cage - a box covered, collage-style, by newspapers.
Everything means something.
``Take the time to read the collage,'' said Barbara West, (no relation to Lois West) who judged the competition. ``Everything in the newspapers is related to college, jobs, going in the military - things high school students worry about.
``I chose this because it makes such an obvious statement about a high school student. The face showed the anxiety - the expression: `which road should I take?'
``And,'' said West, a Suffolk artist and art instructor, ``I thought it was an excellent sculptured piece.''
There is a heart in the bottom of the cage. ``It is a heart waiting,'' Palomares said, ``waiting when I go back to Colombia and all my family and friends again.''
A similar piece by the 17-year-old artist, ``Sins,'' is a foam board creation with a black cross on the bottom. It shows ``the pain Jesus felt,'' Palomares explained.
It shows the Son of God with the crown of thorns, plus the expression of pain that is a Palomares trademark at Rawls.
The young man from Bogota, who has been in this area since February, lives with Genevieve and Jan Groenstyn on Windsor Boulevard, their three children and three foster children.
Palomares, the son of Ana and Julio Palomares, owners of a plywood company called Enchapados del Norte, has been in the area since February. He returns home in July.
``I like it here,'' he said, ``but I miss my country.'' ILLUSTRATION: Staff photo by MICHAEL KESTNER
Julian Palomares, an exchange student from Bogota, Colombia, won the
grand prize with his three-dimensional papier-mache sculpture,
called ``Bad News.''
Graphic
STUDENT ART WINNERS
[For complete graphic, please see microfilm]
by CNB