Students Balance Creativity With School Work

For many students throughout the MBHS community it can be a struggle to balance their art form with the high workload school often requires.

MBHS Senior and talented illustrator Jack Micoli has only recently honed his skills with a pencil. He is particularly drawn to charcoal pencil, which is his favorite to use, because in his words, “the charcoal on my hands makes me look artsy” and because of its ability to create “much more contrast and photorealism.”

He will often spend lots of time on a drawing, capturing every detail he can. His drawings are all in black and white. While Micoli never took art classes outside of school, he says his Mom is who really pushed him to enhance his drawing abilities. Micoli doesn’t experience a huge struggle balancing his school work and drawing, saying “if I have a lot of school work I try to incorporate drawing into it” since “it’s relaxing” and “drawing equals fun.” He simply likes to sit back, relax and draw. Though he said “it is time consuming” Micoli still enjoys the process of making a drawing look extremely realistic with his classic charcoal pencil.

Other students don’t have it quite as easy when it comes to balancing their creative work with their school work.

Kaya Fridman is a junior at MBHS and an avid dancer. She began dancing six years ago and does several types of dance, her favorites being ballet and modern. She talked about how happy dance makes her feel and said, “it fills me with this love for something that is so special” and that “I feel like I can touch the moon just by standing on my toes when I dance, it makes me so happy.” Fridman also wishes to continue dancing throughout her life. Dance is an art form that Kaya truly enjoyed doing. However, she stated how during her junior year, she is so busy between babysitting, SAT practice, and school work that it gives her very little time to dance anymore. She wished that she had more time to dance saying “I feel really lost and confused without it.” Fridman also expressed a desire for there to be more arts classes in MBHS so that balancing school and dance would be easier. Additionally, she said, “the arts is such an important realm that I think is often looked at as boring or pretentious, but creating something you can be proud of is a feeling like no other.”

The senior class’ resident crooner, Daniel Bortoluzzi, first displayed his musical inclination at nine months old. While singing may be what he first gravitated toward, he also plays the piano and the guitar. He feels that music is a “very large part of his personality,” even without pursuing organized groups or lessons for singing, which he thinks could have created different paths for him. But to Bortoluzzi, who will always use “the opportunity to make someone smile by singing to them,” what comes first is his love of entertaining people. Last year, he performed in MBHS’ Phame Talent Show, where he displayed his aptitude for singing, playing guitar and entertaining all at once. Bortoluzzi also uses music for its soothing effects. When frustrated with homework, he finds himself “pulling out his guitar and playing anywhere from thirty minutes to an hour,” and it helps him relax. However, he also faces a similar challenge to Fridman in finding a balance. Occasionally, after a long day of school and having a song stuck in his head, upon arriving home he’ll choose to play the song and procrastinate doing his work. He also recently has taught himself to play the banjo, and he finds it extremely difficult “to walk away from playing the banjo.” Due to how music has positively affected his life, he thinks it would benefit the student body to have the option of taking a music class. He feels that “the room starts to come alive” when people come together to play music or just listen, and “it just brings joy.”

Rosie Dunphy, a junior at MBHS, enjoys painting among other fine arts. She takes after her mother, who Rosie said was also an artist. She recalls both going to her mother’s gallery openings with her family and painting with her during her childhood, which was how she got started. Over the summer, Dunphy took art classes at the School of Visual Arts, which she hopes to continue. She thinks the art classes mandated for freshman and sophomores at MBHS are good opportunities to get into painting. Another opportunity she discovered at MBHS is volunteering to paint murals around the building for NY Cares. To describe her current relationship with painting, she said “I incorporate it in my life mostly by doing it in my free time.” However, she finds this free time limited by her workload from school. Balancing school work and creative activity is difficult for Dunphy, because she is trying to receive high grades this year, and as a result, does not have much time left over for painting. She says, “I find myself not able to be creative to my full extent and get ideas for art when I’m stressed about dealing with school.” As a junior, she does not have art in her curriculum so she is left to paint solely in her own time, in which school takes a priority. Regardless of the obstacles that get in the way of her art, Dunphy’s passion for painting is not going anywhere, and she plans to continue pursuing her skills.