Art Students Depict Social Issues With Tape Murals

Chris Ybarra

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Proms Of The Past
May 14, 2021
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Nikki Alderson, Reporter

Junior Cole Babb creates a tape mural in the hall for art class. It is part of a series of murals about teen social issues. This one depicts mental illness.

The Art II and III classes worked on a series of tape murals around the school for their most recent art project. The pieces were created using blue masking tape and depicted common social issues in today’s world. Each piece of artwork was placed in a different part of the hallways on the west side of the school.

“As a class, students discussed what social issues they see within their school, home and community,”  art director Judith McGinty said. “Students were then grouped by which social issue they would like to represent around LHS. Through small group collaboration, students created a line drawing to transfer via tape to the LHS hallways.”

Some of the issues presented in the drawings include mental illness, social media abuse and substance abuse, which are problems that teens often encounter throughout their high school career. 

I want students to not only have awareness of social issues, but to know they can have a voice through visual representation,” McGinty said.  “As artists, it is our job to be a medium, conductor and a representative of our culture. Historically, any medium which represents a culture comes through the hands of artists, writers, architects, etc.  Young artists need to be aware of their power and influence of their generation.”

The drawings were created independently by art students, who developed the pieces as a way to visually represent not only issues they face in school, but also issues that they face outside of school.

“They [the pieces] are awesome,” senior Zeb Bender said. “They shed light on important social issue our generation is facing. I hope the art helps inspire people who might be facing those problems to be resilient.”