Art Club Spotlight: Drawing and Painting Club

The Drawing and Painting Club at Edinboro, led by president Ava Lenart, is willing to take both the good and bad of operating through COVID-19. Yes, events have been cancelled and membership is currently down. But, they’ve also brainstormed new ways of holding events and workshops that could be carried into a post-pandemic world.

In our first installment of the Art Club Spotlight, meet the Drawing and Painting Club.

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“We used to have meetings every other week,” said Lenart. Pre-pandemic, the club put on a variety of different events: fundraisers, trips to museums, local art events, guest speakers and workshops. Lenart explained that “we did a decent amount of stuff.”

Last semester, the club obviously transitioned to a mixture of in-person and online components. “It was such a whirlwind,” began Lenart, “just because there were people [on campus] and online places [so] it was hard to get together as a club and do things.” Despite the hardship, the club was able to get together to paint a mural in support of breast cancer awareness month. The mural is a pair of pink Monarch butterfly wings framing a breast cancer ribbon (see above).

Other than the mural, Lenart explained that the club didn’t do as much in the fall. They’ve been hoping to change that this semester, though, and Lenart said that “we have more virtual things planned, and we’re hoping that’ll work out for everybody.”

These events include virtual tours of art department professors’ studios and works. And with different travel bans currently in effect across the nation, Lenart said that it’s difficult to go and look at art. The club is looking into Instagram live feeds of museums and other interactive options to help with that. The club is also planning to host Zoom workshops.

Lenart is hopeful that the club will find a way to incorporate these new experiences into the club’s future programming when COVID-19 eventually falls to the backburner. “This is my last semester, so where the club goes from here is not really up to me, but I do think it would be wise for the club to continue to have online components, or at least be able to broadcast some things on our different media platforms. That way we have a bigger audience,” she said.

Lenart added that with technology, the club will be able to bring people in from outside of the university.

Most of the group’s usual fundraisers, like something they call “Mini-Masterpieces” — getting together to paint and sell miniature canvases on easels to make ornaments — were cancelled last semester, due to the lack of students on campus. 

This doesn’t mean the club has no funding whatsoever, though. Lenart explained that “we do have funding through SGA, but there are stipulations attached.” This includes the ban on out-of-state travel (for university purposes it's prohibited) and more. She said these restrictions are “totally reasonable; I don’t blame [the university] at all.”

Like other clubs during the pandemic, Drawing and Painting membership has dropped. Lenart explained that, “before COVID, we had about 30 members who would come in and out, so it was decently sized.” Then, “with COVID, those numbers have dropped dramatically just because we haven’t been able to really hold meetings in the sense that we would have liked to.” The club currently has around 10-15 members who attend regularly.

While most of the members involved with the club are art majors, Lenart said that, “it’s for whoever wants to join.”

While the Drawing and Painting Club has faced many challenges with being a hands-on kind of group, they have strived for changes to adapt to the pandemic to keep their club going.

Hazel Modlin is the Executive Editor for The Spectator. She can be reached at edinboro.spectator@gmail.com.

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