Imagine you wake up on a Monday morning to get ready for school just to realize you have no music to get ready with. If that wasn’t enough of a disappointment, now imagine you walk to your kitchen noticing the lack of color and decoration on your empty walls. When you finally sit down to eat breakfast you discover the packaging on your cereal box to be as blank as a white sheet of paper. Not only that, but your clothes are monotone and lack any representation of who you are. Where did all the colors go? What happened to your music? What about your clothing? This is just a small snapshot of what the world would look like if it was devoid of art.
Art is everywhere from the clothes we wear, to the packaging on the products we buy whether we realize it or not. While a large portion of art in our lives goes unnoticed, it has a significant impact on individual expression. For Southeast, art can be found in every hallway. Specifically, it can be seen in the drawings on display by the art rooms and the numerous murals that bring a sense of community.
Southeast’s art not only expresses its history, but its identity as well. As for the students, their expression can be found embedded into the works of creativity seen throughout the school. One of the most notable works of art that can be seen in the halls of Southeast is the Disney mural located in the E-hall stairwell.
As students travel up and down the busy stairwell on their way to class, they may take a moment to admire the mural despite knowing little information about its history and significance.
According to Melody Jones, a retired Southeast pottery teacher, the mural was organized and planned by Lucy Wicks. Wicks and Jones had the pottery classes vote on a Walt Disney quote that would be displayed on the mural. The 2000-2004 pottery classes then brainstormed numerous carvings that would eventually bring the square slabs of clay to life.
The students worked vigorously for an entire semester to complete the clay project. After several months of air drying and carving, the clay squares were fired in the pottery kiln. Soon after the kiln firing, masonry artist Jay Tschetter assembled and installed the clay pieces onto the E-hall stairwell. While Tschetter initially wanted to stain the clay, this plan failed to materialize. Despite this, 20 years later during the 2020-2021 school year, Jones used special paints to finish the fascinating mural that is now seen today.
While the Walt Disney mural reveals a unique perspective of Southeast’s history, it is not the only remarkable display of art in the building. Found just underneath the D-hall stairwell, the stationary metal bike adorned with pink and red rose covered wheels gives the school distinct character. The rose-covered bike was originally created for a city campaign by the artist Jane Striker, a LSE graduate, until it was vandalized and given to the school. Eventually, Daniel Ruth, the current LSE pottery teacher, had his classes hand craft each rose to bring a pop of color to the halls. Those roses then had to be glazed, fired and individually glued onto the bike. The tedious process finally left D-hall ornamented with a captivating new sculpture.
As for the lunchroom, it is embellished with one of the most intriguing works of art found at Southeast, known as the “Investment” mural by Marxhausen. The mural elevates the expansive blank walls with strategically hung structures. While the structures may seem fragmented or random to some, their separated placement along the wall has significant ties to the school’s purpose. The dark colored shapes represent the past being filled with trust and investment. These shapes are symbolic of high school students trusting their teachers and administrators to help them fulfill their potential in the future.
The total of four large shapes pay homage to the changing season and the early settlers of Nebraska that continued to pave the way for others as they trusted and hoped they could one day turn Nebraska’s desert into a garden. These shapes being connected by a green line also demonstrates the trust and hope that began at Southeast. While this mural may not seem connected to Southeast at first look, when the details are thoroughly admired it is not hard to see that even the school’s colors reflect a piece of Marxhausen’s mural. LSE’s signature black and gold colors portray Marxhausen’s idea of trust eventually turning into renewal and new horizons. The deep thought within this mural brings new significance to LSE’s student body as well as emphasizing the school’s optimistic outlooks.
Although the art that decorates the halls of LSE may go unrecognized at times, its presence cannot be ignored when it comes to livening up the school, representing the student body and providing an artistic outlet for expression. Without the one-of-a-kind art seen throughout the school, Southeast would not be the remarkable place that it is today.
“CLINTON COMMUNITY MURAL”
As seen around Lincoln, Nebraska, the Clinton Community Mural is just one of the many alluring paintings that brightens 27th and Holdrege St. According to The Daily Nebraskan, due to the mural’s proximity to Clinton Elementary school, the local Nebraska artists Leora Platte, Gail Erickson and Troy Hettenbaugh drew inspiration from the elementary students’ imaginative drawings. The mural features a whimsical neighborhood decorated with striking colors and charming stick-figure residents. The vibrancy and cheerful nature of the building is sure to catch the eye of any nearby pedestrians. Although the art is not of technical comparison to some of the other murals in Lincoln, its loosely guided illustration style demonstrates the creative liberties of students and gives the entire street an optimistic feel.
“GIRL NOTICED”
So remarkable it can’t go unnoticed, the 23rd and N St. mural by Lori Pratico titled, “Girl Noticed”, never fails to peak the interest of any onlookers. According to Pratico’s official website, while she is not a Nebraska-based artist, she has decorated Lincoln with her non-profit mission to design murals across the states under the program Girl Noticed, Inc. Girl Noticed aims to highlight the perspectives of females in minorities and LGBTQ+ communities. Amongst Practico’s many murals, it features the minimalistic portraits of an Asian-American and a Muslim woman both of whom reside within the community. The woman displayed on the left is identified as Thuy Nguyen, born in Vietnam and owner of Little Saigon Plaza, and the woman on the right, Haifaa Al-Saadi, a community member born in Iraq that immigrated to the U.S. at just two years old. Both portraits serve to pay appreciation to the female minorities in Lincoln. For Pratico, her Lincoln mural isn’t just art, it stands to give the community new perspectives and inspire individuals for years to come.
