MOPA’s 13th Annual Youth Exhibition Features San Diego And Tijuana Artists Ages 6 To 18
When was the last time you visited the MOPA, the Museum of Photographic Arts, in Balboa Park? Our bet is that it’s been too long (or maybe never!), and now is a great time to plan a visit!
The Museum of Photographic Arts is a vibrant center for visual learning. Since its founding in 1983, the museum’s endeavors to consistently address cultural, historical and social issues through its exhibitions and educational programs. Its mission is to inspire, educate and engage the broadest possible audience through the presentation, collection, and preservation of photography, film and video.
That’s cool!
Youth Exhibition
The MOPA is currently presenting its Youth Exhibition, featuring our regions young photographic talent. Now in its 13th year, MOPA’s Youth Exhibition encourages K-12 students in San Diego County and Tijuana to interpret a topic and submit photographic or video art. This year students responded to the theme of Sound.
The exhibit is a partnership with La Jolla Music Society to bring together photography and music. The student art may tackle musical impacts or it can look into ways students are perceiving other sounds.
The prompt encouraged an interpretation with little limitation, and the results are nothing less than amazing!
Deborah Klochko, Executive Director & Chief Curator, had this to say about the exhibition:
“Understanding perception of one sense can sometimes come by synthesizing it using another one of our senses, as is the case of paraphrasing one fine art with the tools of another: poetry to illustrate a dance, musical composition to accompany lyrics or, in this case, photography to interpret music or sound. For the 13th Annual Youth Exhibition call for submissions, we asked students to use visuals that communicated that which they perceive in a sound. How would it look?”
Selecting From 700 Entries A Difficult Job!
Receiving nearly 700 entries, a panel of jurors (professional adults in the fields of art, education, government, etc.) selected final works on the basis of creativity and originality, interpretation of theme, quality, and artist statement or pitch. An artist as young as 6 years old was selected!
The selections range from a black-and-white photograph of a seemingly angry baby screaming out “waah” straight into a lens, to a collage of magazine cutouts of mouths and of messages policing too much or too little talking.
Make A Trip To MOPA!
The Museum of Photographic Arts is one of the many gems in Balboa Park, and definitely worth a visit!
MOPA’s Youth Exhibition is on view September 1, 2018 through January 9, 2019 – be sure to visit while it’s there to see what our young regional talent has produced!
See you there!
