WWRSD—A beloved K-12 art contest, exhibition, and fundraiser launched in 2012 as Hurricane Sandy relief, no stranger to colorful new vistas and perspectives, is changing things up after this 11th anniversary exhibition wraps.
Westwood Gallery (10 Westwood Ave.) and the Westwood Regional School District Art Department proudly announced this year’s 11th (and final) Annual WWRSD has HeART, a student exhibit on peace and togetherness through art.
Students were encouraged to reflect on what inspires them to create an original work of art in response. This year more than 90 works were submitted by students in grades K–12.
Voting was conducted online — a Covid-era invention — and 14 outstanding images were selected as finalists.
An opening reception delighted on Thursday, Feb. 2 at Westwood Regional High School, with the young artists receiving awards before a wave of proud parents’ and grandparents’ mobile devices . The exhibit runs through Feb. 20.
Prints and notecards of the 14 top images are being sold to benefit Artworks, the Naomi Cohain Foundation, “providing children and young adults access to creative arts programs for healing, communication, and self-expression.”
8” x 10” prints by all the artists in the show can be purchased for $5 at the Westwood Gallery and from district art educator Pamela Guenther-Duffus at pamela.duffus@wwrsd.org.
5” x 7” note cards are available at one for $3, five for $10 (mix and match), and all 14 images for $20.
All of the profits will be donated to this worthy cause, Duffus tells Pascack Press.
The prints and cards make excellent Valentine’s Day gifts, she says. Flyers say “Support these students in using their talents to make a difference for our community.”
Duffus told Pascack Press on Feb. 8, “This is our last year doing this, the show. We’re going to reinvent it, come up with something new. We’ve been trying for the past couple of years to move it past just images of hearts.”
She said, “It started out with this idea of what it is to have heart. This year we tried to push the concept of peace and togetherness and get the students to reflect on a theme. It’s about using your art to express an idea or a concept and to do something good with it.”
The Sandy relief was a high school art push. Since then, various charities have benefitted, with the work opened up to all students in the district.
In the program’s run, 154 works have been showcased, with additional pieces featured from Artworks. Many thousands of dollars have gone to charity. Students who’ve won in earlier years have gone on to art school and art/design/illustration careers.
“We have students all over the place; there’s definitely encouragement that happens, and they’ll use these works in their portfolio to get into schools,” said Duffus.
The exhibition is home to all voices. “Painting, digital drawings, some are working with collage… they can pick whatever medium they want,” said Duffus.
And though this is the end for WWRSD has heART, it’s far from the end of the story.
“We’re going to change the title of the whole show and go a different way with it. After 11 years it’s time for a change,” she said.
She lauded Mike Fitzsimmons, who came on board the first year, throwing open his gallery for the annual exhibition. “It’s been a partnership.”
She also thanked art teachers
for Berkeley and Brookside Elementary schools, Barbara Portelli; Washington and Jessie George Elementary schools, Stacey Becan; Westwood Regional Middle School, Lynda Panno; and Westwood Regional High School, where in addition to Duffus there’s Amy Grossman, Michele Keller, and Michelle Stoute.
For more information, visit westwoodartgallery.com or call (201) 666-1800.