Support Art Education and Inspire Young Artists

Approximately 6,000-8,000 students register for YoungArts each year, and last month our office was hard at work processing the thousands of applications that came through our doors for YoungArts Week 2010. Throughout the past week the YoungArts office has been bustling with activity and excitement as the annual adjudication process has commenced. This purely anonymous process where all identifying information is removed from application materials ensures the most exceptionally talented students are selected. The adjudication experience provides our distinguished group of panelists with an amazing opportunity to see, hear and read the artwork of so many talented students.

Our impressive panel of judges consists of over 60 experts in their respective fields, representing nine artistic disciplines in the visual, literary and performing arts: Cinematic Arts, Photography, Visual Arts, Dance, Theater, Writing, Voice, Jazz and Music. Our panelists have the very difficult task of selecting up to 150 students as YoungArts Finalists.

Each panelist evaluates all participants within their respective YoungArts discipline to choose the finalists. The week long process begins with a panel of preliminary judges who narrow down the large pool of applicants to those with the highest scores for the national adjudicators to choose the finalists. Each application is carefully evaluated and given a score between 1 and 10. Ten represents finalists invited to Miami, nine represents Honorable Mention award recipients and eight represents Merit award recipients.

Once the process is complete and just before the Thanksgiving holiday, YoungArts staff has the exciting task of calling each of the 150 finalists and notifying them of their invitation to YoungArts Week 2010. The finalists are officially announced in early December.

Only two months later, the most talented 17 and 18 year olds in the country will be welcomed to Miami for YoungArts Week, an all-expense-paid week of master classes, showcase performances, exhibitions, enrichment programs, and final adjudications with awards up to $10,000 to continue their craft.

Support YoungArts Week 2010: To support the 2010 YoungArts Week program, please consider making a small contribution at this time. Any donation is greatly appreciated and will go a long way for these emerging artists.

YoungArts Alumni Take a look at what some of our YoungArts Alumni are up to these days:

Tarell Alvin McCraney, 1999 YoungArts winner in Theater (Merit): While studying at the Yale School of Drama, McCraney developed a trilogy of plays that are now being performed for this first time in their entirety in New York at the Public Theater. His plays have been performed all over the world in New Haven, Atlanta , Dublin and London.

Chad Rehmann, 1999 YoungArts winner in Music Composition (Level I): Chad recently collaborated with composer Andres Boulton to provide music for the upcoming ABC Original Movie, “The Dog Who Saved Christmas”. This holiday film, starring Mario Lopez, Dean Cain, and Adrienne Barbeau will premiere on Sunday, November 29th, at 8:00 pm, on the ABC Family Channel as part its annual “Countdown to 25 Days of Christmas” event.

Lindsey Maxon, 2009 YoungArts winner in Writing/Creative Non-fiction (Level III): Lindsey is currently attending the University of Texas and has recently received an honor from Scholastic Art and Writing Awards for the Best Teen Writing of 2009 for her Science Fiction short story. In addition, she had an article published in the MENSA bulletin.

Marie Fuchs, 2009 YoungArts winner in Visual Arts(Level II): Marie is currently attending the California Institute of the Arts and has recently received many exciting honors. She was awarded First Prize from the VSA ARTS in the amount of $10,000. In addition, through Scholastic Art and Writing Awards, she received a Gold Award for her portfolio and a Silver Award for her individual work of art.

Links:

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DfNAtrqXOFc