All Oak Hills High School students electing to enroll in an Art and Design Department course will develop a Competitive Advantage, Appreciation of the Arts, Creative Thinking and Problem Solving Skills, Interdisciplinary Connections, Social and Global Awareness, and Career Preparation related to Visual Communication.
Congratulations to the OHHS Art and Design students’ whose art was selected as a High Merit piece for the Fall 2025 Celebrating Art competition and publication! Receiving a Top Ten or High Merit award means the art was an exceptional piece. Out of thousands of entries received for the Fall 2025 contest, they stood out as being one of the top 5% submitted. Students who have art selected as Top Ten or High Merit work will receive special recognition in the book as it is displayed as a Top Ten or High Merit piece.
Congratulations to the following students:
From Schorsch’s AP Art and Design 2D Design and Drawing, Drawing and Printmaking, and Studio Art Foundations classes:
Anastasia Brantley Evelyn Dann Maria Arrivillaga Munoz Anna Schuler Lydia Wilson
Anastasia BrantleyEvelyn DannMaria Arrivillaga MunozAnna SchulerLydia Wilson
From Dignan-Cummins’ AP Art and Design 3D Design class:
Congratulations to OHHS Art and Design senior Lydia Wilson, whose portfolio of works was 1 of the 12 Semi-Finalists selected from this year’s entries for the 2026 Visual Arts Competition of The Overture Awards.
Congratulations to OHHS Music senior Logan Nerlinger, was selected as 1 of the 13 Semi-Finalists selected from this year’s entries for the 2026 Vocal Music Competition of The Overture Awards.
Lydia and Logan will compete against the other Semi-Finalists from schools around the region. Entries advancing to the finals will be announced on February 13th, 2026.
The Overture Awards Competition is the area’s largest solo arts competition and offers awards in six artistic disciplines: creative writing, dance, instrumental music, theater, visual art, and vocal music. For the 2026 competition, students may win $4,000 (one awarded in each discipline) or a $1000 finalist award. Judges at all levels of the competition are drawn from the professional arts community.
Congratulations Lydia and Logan and best of luck heading in the Semi-Finals!
OHHS Art and Design teacher, Ms. Schorsch, will be one of the artists exhibiting in the Kennedy Heights Art Center’s Rooms of Grief, a powerful and deeply human exhibition running January 17th through March 14th, 2026. Co-curated by Ena Nearon of Ten Talents Network and Mallory Feltz (KHAC), the exhibition brings together 59 artists whose work explores the many forms grief can take and the ways art can help us process, hold, and heal from loss.
Rooms of Grief considers grief not as a single emotion, but as a series of emotional spaces we move through when loss reshapes our world. These “rooms” function as metaphors: places of silence, memory, anger, longing, tenderness, confusion, and, at times, renewal. Together, the artworks reveal grief as layered and personal; experienced through the loss of loved ones, identity, relationships, health, community, and imagined futures. While sorrow is present, so too are transformation and resilience, showing how creativity can give form to what is often unspeakable.
The exhibition highlights the role of art as a healing practice, one that allows grief to be witnessed rather than hidden, shared rather than isolated. For many artists, making the work becomes an act of care, remembrance, and survival; for viewers, it offers recognition, empathy, and permission to feel.
Schorsch will be exhibiting two mixed media pieces in the exhibition. “The Charioteer’s Resurgence” explores grief as both burden and transformation. “The Tempered High Priestess” explores grief as a force that dismantles and reshapes identity. Through mysticism, symbolism, and self-portraiture, Schorsch confronts identity fractured by trauma, allowing grief to guide healing and reveal strength forged through transformation.
Exhibiting artists include: Patricia Acker, Ebony Alli, Lisa Andrews, Cora Arney-Georgilis, Lauri Ann Aultman, Brooke Cahill, Nina Caporale, Susan Carlson, Ben Casuto, Samuel Casuto, Robert Coates, Heather Conley, Isabella Crowe, Billie Cunningham, June Pfaff Daley, Leslie Lehr Daly, Dan Dickerscheid, Deborah Dixon, Mary Anne Donovan, Judith Effa Ford, Melvin Grier, Nikita Gross, Zephyr Grove, Ell Halim, Kendall Hall, Donna Hardy, Robin Hartmann, Art Hasinski, Jessica Grady Heard, April Huerta, Lindsey Hurst, Ruth Jose, Michael Kearns, Deborah Kovacs-Sturdevant, Cynthia Kukla, Robyn Lince, Lindsay McCarty, Micah Mickles, Carol Mohamed, Amy Mueller, Mia Natas, Zoë Peterson, Kat Rakel-Ferguson, Su Ready, Fatemeh Rezaei, Janet Rocklin, August Roth, Anastasia Schneider, Gerrie Schon, Jamie Schorsch, Zachary Severt, Charlemae Sexton, Kimberly Wilfong Sigman, Emily Sites, Matt Steffen, Shawn P. Sweeney, Megan Taylor, Brianna Wallace.
The exhibition opens with a public reception on Saturday, January 17th from 6–8pm, inviting the community to gather for an evening of art, reflection, and connection. This event is free and open to the public. Additional programming extends the exhibition’s themes beyond the gallery. A Panel Discussion on navigating grief will take place on Saturday, February 7th, 2026 from 1–3pm at the Kennedy Heights Arts Center Lindner Annex (6620 Montgomery Road, Cincinnati, OH 45213). This conversation is free and open to the public. A facilitated Art Therapy workshop is also being planned; participation will be free, with registration required due to limited space. Details will be announced soon on KHAC’s website.
50 Years of Inspiration is a powerful exhibition celebrating the extraordinary career and lasting influence of Jan Thomas, artist and former Oak Hills High School (OHHS) art teacher, whose dedication to arts education has shaped generations of creative professionals. Spanning five decades of teaching, mentorship, and artistic practice, the exhibition highlights the profound impact one educator can have on students and communities alike.
The exhibition brings together 128 artworks, including 15 works by Jan Thomas and 113 pieces created by former students, offering a multi-generational portrait of creative growth. Among the artists represented are 26 former OHHS students, eight of whom are now art educators themselves, continuing Thomas’s legacy in classrooms across the region. The title 50 Years of Inspiration reflects a remarkable full-circle moment: two exhibiting artists were students during Thomas’s very first year of teaching at Regina High School in Norwood, 50 years ago. Their inclusion underscores the enduring relationships and creative influence that have defined Thomas’s career.
Artists in the exhibition represent a wide spectrum of creative paths, including college professors, photographers, graphic designers, tattoo artists, community arts leaders, independent artists, and a nationally recognized drag performer. The exhibition also features a clay mosaic artist whose work directly inspired the mosaic tile walls at Oak Hills High School, as well as a Northside arts naturalist currently building a permaculture cobb house, illustrating the expansive ways art connects to place, purpose, and community.
The exhibition opens with a public reception on Sunday, January 11th, from 3:00–5:00 p.m. Come out to celebrate an educator whose commitment to creative thinking has left a lasting imprint on students, schools, and the broader arts community, and mingle with OHHS alumni, current, and former art teachers. The show will remain on view at Ruth’s Parkside Cafe (located at 1550 Blue Rock St, Cincinnati, OH 45223) through the end of February.
“The Memory Project” is a nonprofit organization that invites art teachers and their students to create portraits for youth around the world who have faced substantial challenges, such as neglect, abuse, loss of parents, and extreme poverty. Over the past ten years, Drawing and Printmaking and NAHS students have created over 500 portraits for children in Madagascar, the Philippines, and Syrian refugees in Jordan, Puerto Rico, the Rohingya in Rakhine, Columbia, Nigeria, Cameroon, Sierra Leone, and India. This year, students at OHHS created portraits for 30 Cambodian children.
Children in Cambodia face a complex set of challenges that affect their safety, education, health, and long-term opportunities. Many children grow up in poverty, which limits access to adequate nutrition, clean water, sanitation, healthcare, and stable housing, particularly in rural areas. Malnutrition and preventable illnesses remain common and can have lasting effects on physical and cognitive development. Although education is officially free, hidden costs, the need for children to work to support their families, and uneven school quality often lead to irregular attendance or early dropout, with girls sometimes facing additional barriers due to gender expectations. Child labor, trafficking, and exploitation continue to place vulnerable children at risk, while child protection systems are under-resourced and struggle to respond effectively to abuse and neglect. These challenges are further intensified by climate change, as floods, droughts, and heat affect food security, health, and livelihoods, creating an environment in which many Cambodian children must navigate overlapping social, economic, and environmental pressures as they grow up.
“The Memory Project” portraits are created by students enrolled in the Drawing and Printmaking course (grades 9-12). The students began by analyzing the artwork of Kehinde Wiley and used the information provided about the children’s favorite things, colors, and hopes for the future to design the background of the image. Once the portraits are delivered to the children, we will receive a video of their reactions to the artwork. Below are some of the highlights of the OHHS Drawing and Printmaking students’ resulting portraits.
OHHS Art and Design 