From concept to canvas: Inside a student-run art exhibit

An art exhibit took place at Mohawk’s Social Inc. on Nov. 25. The interesting thing about it? It was completely organized and run by students.

For a group project, marketing students banded together to create the exhibit from start to finish, and everything in between.

Mariam Suliman explained that she and her group organized everything, “from finding a sponsor, planning out what the idea is going to be, the setting up of everything, finding the artists, marketing for the event.

“We planned everything from the snacks, tablecloths, easels for the artwork,” Suliman said. “It’s a whole big thing and it helps us for our marketing program.”

Candice Benjamin, a group member of the project, shared the process of sourcing the artists and approaching them with the idea of displaying their work.

“We asked that people bring forth what they were comfortable with sharing,” Benjamin said. “Some people find their art to be very vulnerable, so we didn’t want anyone to feel like we were asking too much of them.

“We got a lot of anime art styles, we got some more contextual stuff, cultural stuff as well. I feel like it was a good mix of different medias and different types of art, which made, in my opinion, the exhibit more interesting.”

From colourful paintings and sketchbooks full of drawings to canvases with moss glued to them and TVs displaying digital art, there was an abundance of expressions throughout the room.

Rida Malik, another group member, shared her thoughts on the featured artwork.

“Mohawk has some great artists,” Malik said. “It’s insane the diversity of artists that we have—even the digital artwork and the photography on the screens.”

Suliman mentioned that they had a “surprising turnout” of 20 people more than their projected attendance goal.

“We’ve had more than 50-something people and our goal was 30 people,” she said. “It’s amazing and it’s going pretty good so far.”