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Living form of art: Finlandia University students show designs, artwork

HANCOCK — The creativity of Finlandia University students was on display last week both on the walls and the runway.

Finlandia’s International School of Art and Design held its annual juried exhibit and fashion show at the Finnish-American Heritage Center on March 29.

It’s been a tradition at Finlandia since the gallery opened 20 years ago, said gallery director Carrie Flaspohler.

“I’ve been gallery director for 15 years, and I think this is one of the strongest shows we’ve had in terms of quality and variety, just the skill that the students are displaying in this show,” she said.

A jury of three people — a community artist, a faculty member and graduating senior — choose from among student submissions. They also choose awards: Best of Show; freshman, two-dimensional and three-dimensional; a faculty award; and the purchase award.

“They look at the principles of design, they look at how the student has composed the piece, they look at the color, the emphasis — all of those tenets of design,” Flaspohler said. “And creativity, of course.”

Along with the exhibit was a student and alumni fashion show organized by Phyllis Fredendall, a professor of fiber and fashion at Finlandia. Students and community members modeled the clothes.

Both in the exhibits and fashion show, students made use of fabric donated to the department. Hannah Smith reconfigured a donated sari for her “Sari not sorry,” which the university purchased for its collection. Runway models showed off designs incorporating fabrics from sources such as the Celebrations Bridal and Formal.

Fredendall emceed the fashion show, introducing each piece. Along with mentioning the designer and models, she pointed out the materials involved — and in the case of one student’s yellow shift, an entertaining background story involving her eight nieces.

“She challenged them to make a drawing to design garments, and it was her eight-year-old niece who won the design competition,” Fredendall said.

Best of Show in the juried exhibition went to Jessica Gill, a junior fiber and fashion design major, for an untitled woven piece with intricate multicolored concentric circles. Gill also displayed pieces in the fashion show.

“It’s just awesome,” she said. “I’m so thankful for everything I’ve learned here and the opportunity to be able to be in this show and show all these pieces of mine.”

Gill also finished second in two-dimensional for a screen printing. Though her fiance is a screenprinter, she had never tried it before.

“I had a lot of fun with that one,” she said. “We actually created a stencil and then screenprinted using our stencils. I had to make a few stencils to get all those colors on there. It broke a couple times.”

She’s considering screenprinting for her final project. As for the work on the wall, it will eventually be folded into her primary field — fashion.

“I plan to eventually make it into some sort of garment, but now it’s just going to be a wall hanging,” she said.

The exhibition will be on display at the FAHC through April 18.

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