Picture to painting

Alexandria Birk came back to her hotel room in Memphis, Tenn., after a long day at the Mid-South Fair last year and snapped a photo of herself in the bathroom mirror.

"I was like, 'Well my hair looks kind of cool so I'm going to take a picture,'" she said.

The picture did not resurface until she received a self-portrait assignment in art class at Saxony Lutheran High School a few months ago. She said she wanted to create a bold and unique version of the assignment.

After winning the 8th Congressional District Art Contest, her artistic interpretation of the photo will be on display in the U.S. Capitol for the next year.

Birk, a senior, won the contest with her self-portrait, an acrylic painting titled "Not Smiling." She competed against more than 200 other entries for the annual contest, which included high schools throughout the congressional district.

She said the win was unexpected.

"Not a goofy girl who took a picture in the mirror at 3 a.m. and painted it all funky," she said.

Birk said she will attend Southeast Missouri State University next year to study art or to become a history teacher. Regardless of her career path, she said, art will stay with her on a daily basis.

"Today I sketched a boy that fell asleep in class," she said. "He was still enough that I could draw him."

She said she prefers painting, using modernist colors and shapes.

"I want to work big, and I want to work bold," she said.

The bright colors and whimsical expression jumped out of the painting, said Vicki Outman, one of three judges who scored the competition. She said Birk's painting was a statement about teens in the digital age.

"They see each other and themselves almost in a media world, yet her eyes were so expressive," she said.

Outman said technology is ingrained in teenagers' lives, which was demonstrated by the painting.

"They can be 10 feet from each other, but they're talking to each other on a cell phone," she said.

Outman and the other judges whittled more than 200 entries down to one best of show and 10 other honorable mention works. She said the best entries reflected the student's personal experience.

"It may not be the most professional looking, the most precise looking, but you could tell the student put a lot of personal effort and exploration into the piece," she said.

abusch@semissourian.com

388-3627

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Pertinent address:

2004 Saxony Drive Jackson, MO