FERGUS – It was a night of competition between students from UGDSB high schools but this battle wasn’t taking place on a football field or with a lacrosse stick but behind an easel by students wielding paint brushes.
Centre Wellington District High School (CWDHS) hosted the public board’s first Battle of the Brushes, where students were given 20 minutes to complete a painting in any method they deemed fit.
Four high schools were represented at the event Wednesday evening including CWDHS, Guelphs’ John F. Ross and College Heights Secondary School, and Orangeville’s Westside Secondary School.
“Many of the students have been practicing to get ready for this event, like coming up with images that they want to do and practicing laying down the paint quickly,” said Jen Main, art teacher at CWDHS and one of the event’s organizers.
Main said speed painting is great for building painting skills and confidence.
“The speed painting allows the kids opportunities to create without the pressure of making it perfect,” Main said. “They get to use non-traditional materials if they choose to put down their paint … It helps with problem solving really because they have 20 minutes, so like ‘what do I do first? What do I do second? Knowing that I can’t stop in between and blow dry or wait for my paint to dry.”
Students from Grade 9 to 12 competed in two heats with seven students moving on in total – there was a tie for third in the second heat – to a final round based on an audience vote. The winner of the event splits the proceeds from a silent auction of all the Battle of the Brushes paintings with the Centre Wellington Food Bank.
Bella Friel, a Grade 12 CWDHS student, ended up as the evening’s winner with a black and white she said was “kind of a self portrait.”
“I didn’t have a reference or anything, I just whipped something out of my head that I thought of in the moment,” Friel said. “I draw portraits a lot so it was kind of easy to start a base on myself and then I kind of started doing random brushstrokes and like just letting my hands run free, kind of zoning out.”
Friel said she was happy with the event as her school’s speed painting club started out very small and this event was able to bring together about 25 students in friendly competition.
“I was praying for a lot of other people too because I thought there’s were amazing so I was going to be happy either way,” Friel said.
