OHHS senior Taylor Glover created a powerful documentary for Mrs. Gibson’s Video Technology class about her impact of the COVID-19 on the lives of community members.

In the planning of her documentary, Taylor wanted to focus on publicizing. Taylor stated, “It will show the viewers an inside look at the topic and make certain details known. It’s going to spread awareness on the topic. The subject matter of my documentary is how the coronavirus is affecting Cincinnati. Since this is a very strange time we are living in, I thought it would be cool to document the experiences we are having during this time. I’m going to try my best to record how we are dealing with coronavirus locally, to show an inside look at how our area is feeling and what we are doing”.

Taylor focused on the effect of the first pandemic in 100 years on Cincinnati, more specifically Hamilton County, and how people in her hometown are dealing with the Coronavirus. She worked to give a personal, detailed, twist on the telling of the events and interviewed other’s to gain their perspectives and discuss their experiences. All interviews were conducted online which further demonstrates how the Coronavirus has affected our society directly.  In conducting her interviews, Taylor asked her subjects to consider the following items that are currently on many people’s minds:

How have you been feeling on this stay at home order?
How have you been coping with it?
How long do you think this will last?
Are you hopeful about the future?
What have you been doing to keep life as normal as possible?
How are you staying connected with everyone?
How has COVID-19 affected you personally and professionally?
It’ll add personality to the documentary.

Throughout her composition of the documentary, Taylor considered the use of a variety of long, medium, and close up angles to keep the audience engaged and used tripods, cameras, and lighting to create a professional grade product. She considered the use of close-ups to create drama, medium shots for interviews, and long shots for landscapes. Taylor emphasized that for interviews in-person “they won’t be as close up because I wanna show through the filming that we have to stay 6 ft apart”.

It’s Raining Barrels!

The Rain Barrel Art Project was created to promote the use of rain barrels throughout the Ohio River Valley area through a creative and educational medium. The Rain Barrel Art Project desires to educate people on environmental issues like stormwater runoff, watersheds and water conservation.

Rain barrels continue to grow in popularity across the country. However, one of its biggest drawbacks is their dull appearance. Some people are less likely to use them given their negative aesthetic impact on residential and commercial landscaping, even though they conserve water and save money. The “Save Local Waters” initiative believes that producing beautiful artistic rain barrels that have unique painted details will make them more desirable and naturally increase interest to promote their use.

This year, Ms. Kopf’s Painting and Mixed Media students created 3 Rain Barrels for the event. The effects of COVID-19 impacted the original display and auction dates that would have taken place today…but the event will still go on with the following revised dates!

The Rain Barrels will be on display at the Cincinnati Zoo from July 1st-28th and the online auction will take place from July 18th-28th. On July 28th all auctions will be final and an Artist Reception will take place at the Twilight Tuesday event.

Planting Peace

The Painting and Mixed Media students have been busy this year! In addition to the Save Local Waters Rain Barrels, students have been hard at work preparing flower pots for the Christ Hospital Guild and a special grant project. Be on the lookout for the finished products in the future!

OHHS Art and Design Video Technology students took a few minutes to share something good in our current situation. It helps all of us to understand better when we share our perspective. You may be an essential worker, babysitting siblings so parents can work from home, helping friends and family coping to stay well. We have plenty of negatives to talk about, let’s focus on the positives. They may be harder to find but will help us get through this.

Here is a sampling of a few of the student commentaries.

On March 12th, our OHHS Art and Design students left for Spring Break uncertain of what the rest of the school year would look like and some of their projects came to a screeching halt. Here is a glimpse of some of the murals the students were working on and what they will return to and complete in the future.

The NAHS Nicki Musgrove Memorial Mural
NAHS was moving right along with the revision of the Nicki Musgrove memorial mural. Nicki was a beloved OHLSD Art Teacher that inspired the students at Rapid Run Middle School. In 2012, Nicki lost a long-fought battle with breast cancer but her memory and words live on in the halls of OHHS where many of the students she taught continued their studies in art and design.

The Michelle Taylor Memorial Mural
Right across from the Nicki Musgrove mural, spanning the massive wall in the courtyard will be the home of the Michelle (Minkle) Taylor Memorial Mural. Tragically, and unexpectedly, Minkle passed away in 2018. Minkle inspired her students and colleagues with her passion for teaching, her impact on OHHS will never be forgotten. The Painting and Mixed Media students, along with a little help from Kopf’s Art Foundations students, started the massive undertaking of preparing the wall which will be an amazing addition to the courtyard when completed.

Destanie Sexton’s Capstone Mural
Right up the stairs from the memorial murals, is a mural that was designed and created by OHHS Art and Design student Destanie Sexton as a part of her Capstone project exploring the emotional impact of public art. Destanie will be graduating this year, but we won’t leave her mural incomplete! This project will be added to next year’s list of works to complete.

Legacy Murals
In 2018, the Painting and Mixed Media classes began the tradition of creating Legacy Murals. Each year, each class will create a mural on AlumaCorr that commemorates the year’s events. The completed panels are then installed in the ‘Mile Long’ hallway. While the 2020 murals won’t be possible to complete this year, I’m sure the 2021 murals will weave in the impact of the events of the 2019-2020 school year.