PHS student wins state medal for art

May 14—It may be Kylee Folk's first year in art, but she's already a pro earning a medal at the Visual Art Scholastic Event.

The 18-year-old Permian High School senior created four ceramic cups with a sea creature theme.

Her teacher Luis Trejo Fuentes asked her to make the cups for competition.

The closing reception took place Tuesday at the Ector County ISD Visual Arts Advanced Academic Art Exhibition in the Nancy Fyfe Cardozier Gallery in the Visual Arts building.

It was the seniors' last big event in Visual Arts before they go on to college.

"My mom really likes stingrays, so I started with a stingray and it was not my best cup. It was my first cup, so it was all kinds of wonky," Folk said.

But it helped her decide on a sea creature theme for the cups.

"I did a coral reef and I put an oyster on it and it. That was really cool and then I put a whale and I painted it all blue and I did an octopus cup with a little octopus inside. It was really cool. That was my favorite," Folk said.

When they were judging everything at state, Fuentes told Folk that she got a medal.

"... I was like no way. I was like, that's really cool ... He has it for me because I didn't want to lose it. He has it and he gave it to me and then I gave it back to him, but he gave it to me and I showed my parents ...," Folk said.

She plans to study geoscience at University of Texas Permian Basin and make pots on the side.

"I've always really liked art," Folk said.

Her parents were concerned that she couldn't make a living from it, but she enjoys it because "you can take stuff from your head and just bring it to life."

Folk said she's sticking with ceramics and clay for now.

"I tried making rings with metal and stuff, but they kept falling apart. So I was like maybe that's not my thing. I tried drawing and I'm not really good at that either. I think I'm really just good at clay and ceramics and stuff," she added.

She also enjoys sculpture because it's not two-dimensional, even though you can make things look three-dimensional.

"I like how you can like move the cups around and you can see the different elements. I made a cup that has a huge smile, and if you turn it around, you can see the lips coming out and it's really cool. So I like that you can see everything popping out," Folk said.

She said Fuentes had to help her figure out how to do that.

"He taught me how to score things and then place more stuff on there so that it came out. I didn't know I could do that because with the cups I was just doing little tentacles and stuff. But on the recent cup that I did, I made an actual mouth popping out from a cup and I was so impressed. ...," Folk said.

Fuentes said Folk is a fantastic student.

"She had never taken art before and for somebody that's never done art before, she's achieved so much. She's great; she's eager to learn. She's a natural born sculptor," Fuentes said.

He added that when she was on the pottery wheel, she "basically got it all by herself."

Another student, Alexis Knight, won 11 awards in art. Fuentes said she's very quiet and doesn't brag.

"She won Best in Show at the ECISD show, which is the highest prize. She won three first-place ribbons at the ECISD show as well, two regional VASE medals, one area VASE medal. She's in the Permian Hall of Fame. She got the Award of Excellence in Art, Senior Art Award and she's in the PHS top 10 percent, graduating ... next week with honors," Fuentes.

"We just barely realized this until two days ago that she had accumulated so much stuff," he added.