Saturday was a day of music, dance and art endeavors.

Photo Gallery

SMA Student Spring Art Show

The Spencer Museum of Art student advisory board hosts a spring student night on Thursday, April 29th.

Performance art including the KU African Dance group, Les Belles and the KU African Drum ensemble, live music by local bands, face painting, sidewalk calligraphy and local and student artists displaying and selling their artwork.

The Spencer Museum of Art Student Advisory Board hosted its third annual Spring Arts and Culture Festival on Mississippi Street Saturday. Artists from the University and the Lawrence community paid $10 and $20, respectively, for 10-foot by 10-foot booths at the festival.

From 1 p.m. to 4 p.m., local and student artists manned their booths, ready to show off — and hopefully sell — their creations to the public.

Sarah Taggart

On Sarah Taggart’s table lay the drawings, photographs, spray-painted and splattered T-shirts and screenprints, she had created throughout the year — all for $10 or less.

Taggart, a senior from Overland Park, said her motivation for what she creates varies. She pulled out her sketched rendition of an iconic piece of Grecian artwork.

“With these I was kind of on this art history tinge and I did a series of the Statue of David,” she said. “I took an image of the original statue and would change it somehow.”

Some of Taggart’s most colorful pieces used a technique known as lithography.

In order to make a lithograph, Taggart said, she takes an image, places a piece of glass over it and then paints over the glass along the outline of the image. She lays paper over the painted glass and presses a weight onto it to pick up the color.

“I lift it up and do the next layer of color and keep doing that until I like what I see,” Taggart said. “You can tell where the black and blues overlap.”

Channing Taylor

Channing Taylor, a junior from Wichita, began creating and selling her unique vintage-style jewelry, which ranges from $30 to $60, about three years ago.

“I’ve always loved antiques and I dabbled in beading when I was younger,” Taylor said.

Taylor searches for all different types of antique and vintage artifacts at flea markets, garage sales, estate sales and antique hardware stores. She uses old chains to create layered necklaces and attaches the antique pieces she finds.

Taylor said she loved searching for the vintage items she uses and often finds it difficult to part with some of her creations.

“They’re all one of a kind but sometimes there are some things I find and I know I’ll never see anything like it again,” Taylor said. “I probably need to sell it but I just can’t part with some of these things.”

Emily Johnson

Although Emily Johnson is only a junior at Lawrence High School, she said she had been drawn to creating art since she was much younger.

But it wasn’t until her first year of high school that her passion for photography began, and she had plenty to show for it on Saturday.

“I was really good at shooting portraits and then I branched out doing things that are absent of people,” Johnson said. “This year my concentration is silent communications, the idea of what people try to communicate with leaving things behind.”

Johnson’s photo spread ranged from smaller portraits to larger, framed scenic stills.

Johnson said she gets inspiration from everything around her.

“I just shoot all the time,” Johnson said. “My camera is always with me. It’s in my car right now.”

A series of her photos were displayed at La Prima Tazza, a coffee shop downtown, a few months ago. Next for Johnson is a summer photography program at The Art Institute of Boston in July.

Madison Rheah

Madison Rhea’s collection of paintings incorporates a wide range of color with acrylic paint, watercolor and oil. Rhea, a 2009 KU alumnus from Dallas, said his art was the result of a recent interest in Henri Matisse, a French painter known for his use of color.

Rhea’s style is a combination of still life and interiors, he said. He usually paints on very large canvas but decided to scale them down for the festival. The original pieces are priced between $50 and $100.

Rhea said he used other paintings as models for his work.

“Some of them are compiled from thoughts in my head and from photographs of other paintings artists have done,” Rhea said.

— Edited by Ashley Montgomery