By Amelia Faircloth
From an intricate collage crafted from cut pieces of magazines to a memoir about family and Chinese medicine, the participants in this year's Humanities and Fine Arts Creativity Contest brought their unique perspectives to the competition, which culminated on Give Day earlier this month.
The winners were honored at a lunch event where they were awarded certificates in recognition of their achievement from the acting Dean of Humanities and Fine Arts, Mary Hancock.
The Humanities and Fine Arts Divison Creativity Contest winners were honored at a lunch event, where they received certificates celebrating their achievement from Acting Dean Mary Hancock.
"This is such a treat," Dean Hancock said, addressing the winning students. "It's exciting and inspiring to see what you're doing, and I can't wait to see the work that won the awards."
Created in 2018 in celebration of Give Day, an annual fundraiser supporting campus excellency, the contest highlights creative student voices all across the UCSB campus. Students from all majors were invited to submit original creative works, in visual art, photography, writing, video, or music, with the winning entries to be published on the HFA website.
Students from all divisions, not just Humanities and Fine Arts, submitted entries, providing a diverse pool of work for the panel of judges to choose from.
Valued UCSB donor Doug Fogelson, an accomplished photographer based in Chicago, served as a judge for the competition, along with a team of HFA student interns. As a creative person himself, Fogelson has a special appreciation for the arts. He founded and funds the Ellen Reid Writing Award in memory of his mother, a yearly scholarship granted to students pursuing a career in professional writing.
This year’s entries stuck with Fogelson. "A few of the written pieces are still resonating in my mind, actually, and I do feel I have had a portal to some sort of essence, or something akin to a fingerprint, from these creative students," Fogelson wrote after assessing the works. "I wish them all the best as they continue their artistic journey."
Photographer and valued UCSB patron Doug Fogelson served as a judge for this year’s Creativity Contest, hosted by the Division of Humanities and Fine Arts for UCSB Give Day.
In the prose category, Claudia Lee was awarded first place for “A Beginner’s Guide to Sieng Fung Cha: The Cure-all Chinese Medicine,” a touching memoir about family traditions. Second place went to David Gjerde for his research-based narrative essay “Race to the Surface of the Earth.” Charlie Prindle took home third place for his exciting science fiction story “The Eidolons: Prelude.”
Kiana Perez Granados won first place in the poetry category with “Hormones Mixed With Poetic Hunger,” a free-verse poem on the power and beauty of womanhood. Second place went to Aran Hosseini for his prose poem titled “A Romance.” Third place in the poetry category was awarded to Vivian Walman-Randall for her poem “Notes to Emily.”
There was a tie for first place in the visual art category, with Ethan Lacher’s collage portrait and Pricila Flores’s multimedia piece “Double Lives in Isla Vista” sharing the title.
In photography, Aran Hosseini’s dramatic black and white photograph titled “Melancholia” took first place. Runner-up went to Reed Gaynor for his capture of Yosemite in “Levitating.”
Noah Vela’s emotional acoustic song “Just a Kid” won first place in the music category. Second place went to Charlie Prindle for his instrumental piece “Breathe.” Violet Joy Hansen took home third for her opera performance of “Volta La Terrea” by Verdi.
Over the coming days, the winning contest entries will be featured on the Humanities and Fine Arts website.
The article was written by Amelia Faircloth, a fourth-year UC Santa Barbara student majoring in English. Denise Shapiro, a Film and Media Studies and Communication student, produced the video. They are both Web and Social Media Interns for the Division of Humanities and Fine Arts.