Capturing Memories: Students in the Studio

Every Yuba college arts student participates in the student art shows that we host every semester. Some students are asked to participate in additional shows as well; two students from one of Yuba College’s art professors, Rebecca Wallace’s Advanced Drawing class are preparing their work to install in a showing at the Yuba Sutter Regional Arts Council Theatre Building entryway on December 6th at 11 a.m.

“Jaye” Janice Cintron and Mason Waters are currently putting together their six-piece series that they are showing at the gallery. This is an open show that anyone can attend, to which the arts classes are going to be taking a field trip to see.

Wallace was both Cintron and Waters’ first art professor at Yuba College, and this semester, she had asked them to come up with themes for their series that they would be doing over the course of the class. The drawings that will be featured in the show are pieces from those series.

Cintron said, “I did art in elementary, dropped it in the middle, and started back again as kind of an accident.” She explained how she ended up at one of her first art classes here, “I walked into a painting class by accident. My friend convinced me to just stay and I ended up loving it!” Her mom was an artist, but did not allow her to draw. In high school, Cintron’s mom would throw away all her art supplies, so she kind of gave up.

“I didn’t expect to stick with it. I never picked anything up again until fall of 2016.” Since her long break with drawing, she has redeveloped the love of art that she had when she was younger. She especially loves fine arts and has been getting back into it, little by little. As an art major, she likes being able to create in multiple ways and with different medias, and does not like to limit herself to just one.

When Wallace asked what inspired Cintron, she said that her main influence came from “the beauty of children.” She explained her thoughts on what drives this idea: “there’s so much abuse out there, and I just wanted to focus on the good side of things.” She works from photos that she has taken of her children and turns those into drawings. These start out in graphite, and she puts color into them with pastels.

She likes to take “the special moments of who they are” and turn those moments into art. Her goal is to express joy through her artwork.

Waters’ background in art has been a little more consistent, “I took 2 art classes in highschool, and I’ve been at Yuba College for three semesters. I’ve taken art in each of them.” Waters has taken almost every kind of fine arts class offered here, from drawing and painting to ceramics, printmaking. He wants to transfer to San Fransisco to get a degree in game art.

So far, he has only participated in the school art shows here at Yuba, and his paintings have been hung in the admissions building. This showing will be his first installment in a gallery.

Waters explains his series as more of a story. He says that “it follows a narrative of someone going through depression.” It continues with a single character that travels through different scenes, all gray scale in graphite. Waters says that, “depression is something that everyone goes through.”

The ending was an important part of the story, and Waters says that, ”it shows that you’ll get through it.”

The background style is a little more “cartoonish” while the foreground is more detailed. I asked if the backgrounds had any meaning or symbolism, to which he replied, “I don’t think they did at first, I just wanted the story to be able to continue. I’m trying to keep it the same styling.” Each picture relates back to the previous one. “It’s kind of like an animation, it keeps on going.”

These two artists are excited to be featured in this show, and hope that many people will come out to support them.