The walls of Pleasant Valley high school are being covered with tape installations created by art students from Advanced Drawing.
These art installations are an art project headed by Aimee Peters, an arts teacher at PV. She got the idea from the University of Alabama, and decided it was perfect for students in Advanced Drawing. “I wanted something that was of a higher level. Something that is outside the traditional sense of drawing,” she said.
This art project has marked its fourth anniversary at the high school this year. The Advanced Drawing course is only present during second semester every year. The students working on this project are required to create a piece of artwork using only painter’s tape, but they can choose wherever they would like their art installation displayed in the school.
Peters explains the reasoning behind the choosing of this creative art project. “The idea behind this is so that students can think about the environment of where to transform a space. By having the students display the tape installations in the hallways, allows artwork to be seen by the student body at the school,” she said.
Jei Valle-Riestra is currently participating, despite only taking AP Art. “I had so much fun last year when I took advanced drawing and wanted to do it again,” they said. Valle-Riestra believes that the class focuses on doing projects outside of the box, where students can express themselves individually.
Valle-Riestra’s tape installation is of the characters Princess Bubblegum and Marceline from the American animated series “Adventure Time”. They elaborated on why they decided to create this specific idea. “I wanted to do something in honor of “Adventure Time” because it was an important show that spoke out on important issues,” Valle-Riestra said.
They chose these certain characters to demonstrate representation within Pleasant Valley High School, specifically the LGBTQIA+ community. This advanced form of drawing through tape allows art students to go outside of the box and create what they want people to see throughout the school.