More than 250 students, parents, teachers and patrons packed into Roundhead Brewing at Westinghouse Plaza in Hyde Park to celebrate the artistic achievements of the students of the Academy of the Pacific Rim (APR).

“Today we’re celebrating our middle school and high school students, using our community partner here at Roundhead to showcase the different mediums of 2D art, 3D art, theater, music and more,” said Director of School Operations Andrew Martland. “It’s really nice to be able to showcase our students and have the community come out to meet our students as well.”

The artwork was part of the school’s regular curriculum, and, according to art teacher Emma Farrington, none of the students knew their artwork was going into a gallery like this.

“It’s kind of like been thrown together over the last few months, and it’s taken a lot of different people donating their time to get it together; Andrew Martland specifically,” she said. “If it weren’t for him it wouldn’t have happened at all. I’m so excited for the community to see how talented our kids are. Honestly, a lot of the kids didn’t even know about it until a few weeks ago. This was just art they were making for school and class, not even knowing that it was going to be seen by the community. Next year we’re planning to be more deliberate about it, but all of this artwork was made by the kids just for their courses. This is just the average art at APR.”

The pieces ranged in focus from movie posters to knitted coasters, macro art to cardboard sculpture, and one student even put together their own photo gallery inside of an old Viewmaster. Students also put on theater productions and sang for the gathered crowd.

Students Aa'Niela Smith and Jordyn Golden-Lawrence said they landed more on the traditional side of art in painting. They said this was first time they came to such a gallery.

“We’re very happy,” said Smith. “It’s just great to see them showcase our work and for us to see a different side of people we might not have seen.”

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“And we’re very appreciative of all the work they and the other kids put into it,” said Golden-Lawrence. “It’s a lot of fun.”

Resident Nicole Casimir said she’s a member of a running group that meets up at Roundhead. She said she had no idea the gallery was going on, but filtered in because she was curious. She said it was amazing work.

“We run Mondays and Wednesdays in Hyde Park, and just adding a run to our week. I happened to know the owner here and we meet here for the Live Fit Army,” she said. “The work here is just wonderful. My kids are a bit older now, but we used to go to these things. But it’s always great when kids get to express themselves. I liked the pieces, some said ‘ICE Out’ and another ‘No Gun Violence’. The messages are really good.”

For more information on APR, go to https://www.pacrim.org