Senior Quinn Hane has always had a love for art, but she never considered herself adept at most things. Things such as drawing and painting never came easy to her, but she loved art nonetheless. As she matured in age, she found a love for ceramics, which was something she was stronger at and fell in the artistic category.
“I’ve been doing [sculpting] since middle school,” Quinn said. “I’ve taken sculpture all through high school.”
When Quinn entered middle school, she was opened up to more options than just conventional art classes. With these options, she decided that a class on sculpting sparked her interest. Since taking the class, she has continued with her newfound hobby. Since then, she has taken countless classes on sculpting and has increased her range of studies. She has taken Sculpture 1 and 2, and she has taken AP studio art for two years in a row. Quinn didn’t expect such a love for the craft but found that the difference from other arts was something she was strong with.
Quinn’s preferred art is pottery. She has tried many different ceramic arts, but pottery is the one she found loving the most. She has tried things such as glass art, but it was too unpredictable compared to pottery and ceramics.
“Last year, I explored a lot of mixed media,” Quinn explained. “I did things that deviated a little bit from ceramics, like stained glass, and I did a lot with felts and stuff like that.”
When she sculpts, she will most commonly be found on the wheel making things like bowls and vases. Differing from this, she will occasionally hand sculpt to make something less functional. She will also add her personal embellishments to her sculptures to make them her own in a variety of ways.
“Most of the time I stick with wheel-spun stuff,” Quinn mentioned. “Then, I’ll add my own little embellishments on them like different glazes, colors, and textures. I kind of play around with that.”
Although she has worked with glass, it is something she will try to avoid working with. For Quinn, glass is simply too unpredictable. Although all of sculpting is unpredictable, glass is more unpredictable than other forms. Quinn scrapes lines and designs in the glass, and it is supposed to crack apart in that shape, but it always seems to fall into a different shape when Quinn experiments with it. Although the idea is fascinating, it is not quite for her.
Quinn has people in her life who also share a similar artistic spark. She is very close to her dad, a graphic designer and architect. He went to art school, and this has made their bond even closer.
“He went to art school,” Quinn said. “He has been a big influence on me just wanting to be creative all the time and wanting to be creating art.”
Quinn and her dad are on opposite sides of the spectrum when it comes to art, but it is nice for her to have another person with artistic taste.
She also has a lot of close friends who have influenced her in art and share a similar love. Some of these friends pushed her to take AP art. It was originally something she was doubtful of, but now, she is so happy to be a part of it for a second and final year.
Sculpting is not easy to do outside of school, but when the opportunity arises, she will sometimes take clay home or use other materials for home. She takes as much extra time as she can to make new creations. Sometimes in the summer, she will make her way back to the studio.
Being a senior, Quinn has a lot to look forward to for the years ahead; she will be attending the University of Michigan for Biology Health in Society, and eventually Public Health. Although she will not major in it, she has considered carrying over her artistic love to a minor in Art and Design. Overall, Quinn has made love of something that was quite a surprise and not what she had originally expected to be fond of.
“Art is something that is completely different from [pre-med], but I still love it,” Quinn explained. “If I have the opportunity to work on [ceramics], I will always take it.”
