Cape Girardeau school art teachers put their work on display

A homegrown art exhibit will premiere tonight during First Friday events.

The art instructors from across the Cape Girardeau public school system are bringing their art together under the roof of the Black Door Gallery in downtown Cape Girardeau.

This first Faculty Art Show will have 31 pieces including paintings, sculptures, photography, mixed media, drawings, abstracts and more.

The show opens with a reception from 5 to 9 p.m. today and runs through the end of the month.

"We are excited. This is the first time that all of the art teachers have gotten together and done a show together," said Beth Thomas, who teaches at Cape Girardeau Central High School. "A lot of us show on our own at different venues, but for all of us to show together, it's a first, and we hope it will be one of many."

The teachers had the summer to work on their pieces for the exhibit.

"We've got 100 percent showing," Thomas said.

She said the public will come to see the art, but for the students and their parents, it's an opportunity to see what their teachers have created outside of the classroom and to perhaps take home some influence on their own art.

"It's good for the students to see that we're not just teaching it, but producing [art] ourselves," Thomas said. "I've been encouraging my students to come see, as well as the faculty we work with every day."

As a teacher of art, it is tough for some people to find time to dedicate to their own work.

"You hate to say it, but it does sort of become an excuse," Thomas said. "You have to make yourself do it. I kind of get jealous of my students, thinking, 'Oh, gosh, I'd like to be doing that,' but we're doing it, and I think that's great for all of us -- to be creative."

Sometimes practicing art and being creative can take a backseat to teaching art and tapping creativity.

"I think that if we didn't have this goal of doing a show together, that I would have let other things take priority," said Kim Holman, art teacher at Franklin and Clippard schools. "It was good for me to have that goal to get me to think more along those lines and not just how I'm going to teach it."

Holman traveled to Swaziland in Africa last summer and has put some images from the trip together for her contribution to the exhibit.

"It was good for me to see what my colleagues have done," Holman said. "Even though I haven't seen the show itself, I saw what some of them have already brought, and it's neat to see the talent that they have and the ideas that they come up with."

Holman said it's important for the students to see that they, as teachers, enjoy doing art as well.

"Hopefully it will help them be more motivated in what they enjoy doing," she said.

Pertinent address:

Black Door Gallery, 124 S. Spanish St., Cape Girardeau MO 63703