The boys in Year 7 are extremely lucky to have yet another wonderful opportunity to broaden their experiences and learn more about their many different subjects. This week we are extremely lucky to have an “Artist-in-Residence” to work with the boys and pass on some of their professional expertise.

Ms Michelle Tinta is our Head of Visual Arts at the College and below, she introduces our guest and explains what the he and the boys have been up to this week.

Artist and old boy of St Joseph’s College Chris Fox (93) is currently working in the Art Centre with the Visual Arts Department for two weeks as our guest Artist-in-Residence. This program was initiated in 2011 to allow the students opportunity to work directly with and alongside practicing artists.

Chris Fox is a visual artist who combines architecture with sculptures, interventions, hybrid objects, drawings and models and his formal training as an artist and architect is often apparent in his projects.

He has exhibited nationally and internationally and has received a number of awards and scholarships. He has work held in collections in Australia and he has been commissioned for a number of large-scale projects including private and public art commissions nationally and internationally.

Chris has been provoking some lively engagement with each Year 7 class to construct sculptural mobiles. He has injected a flavour of energy and colour into the Art Centre studios through suspending the mobiles individually from the ceiling of the studios.

We look forward to an install of a selection of these mobiles alongside the Year 9 sculptures that Chris will produce with the assistance of our Year 9 students next week.  The install will be on display in the gallery space within the foyer of the Resource Centre next Tuesday.

A big thank you to Michelle and her team for giving the boys the opportunities that they do and importantly, in the case of Chris Fox, presenting them with a wonderful example of a young man from Joeys who has achieved a huge amount in Visual Art all around the world.

Photo 1: David Kidd (Connells Point) creating a masterpience.

Photo 2: Yilin Wang (West Ryde) putting together his mobile.

Photo 3: Billy Dodds (Gladesville) working next to Harry Gosper (Corlette) under the watchful eye of Chris Fox.

On Friday evening, a huge number of parents and students joined together at the opening of the Student Art Exhibition. We were very fortunate to have Australian painter, sculptor and draughtsman Michael Snape as the special guest and he had been at the College during the week in order to judge the artworks on display.

I won’t pretend to have a great understanding of artwork, however, I am absolutely certain that choosing the best artworks must have been a real challenge. The work that the boys, across all year groups, have created is simply incredible. In speaking with a parent on the steps of the hall, he so accurately put it when he noted the maturity that is evident in the works of the boys.

On display was a huge variety of artwork, ranging from pencil sketches through to videos and including paintings, clay work, books and simply some incredible photography. Specifically, all the boys in Year 7 had an artwork on display and it was wonderful to see their talent in both paintings (some on canvas and some on paper) and clay work.

A huge congratulations goes to Nick Jessup (Lane Cove) who won the award for best artwork in Year 7. His clay work shows superb creatively, fantastic detail and plenty of colour. With some boys having more than one work on display, Nick takes this honour ahead of over 150 other entries. Well done!

Our boys are exceptionally lucky to have so many opportunities here at Joeys. The staff in our Visual Art department do a fantastic job in helping the boys find talent which many of them didn’t realise that they had. I am certain that anyone who had the privilege of attending the Student Art Exhibition would have walked out incredibly impressed with the talent on display. Congratulations to all the boys and a huge thank you to all of their teachers.

Photo 1:  Aaron Murrant (Rozelle) finding his artwork.

Photo 2:  Nick Jessup (Lane Cove) holding his award winning art work.

Photo 3:  Alexander Bland (Kingsford), Lachlan Markey (Coonamble), Eddy Fay (Castle Cove) and Damian Sevil (Narrabri) find their artworks all right next to each other.