Students from Osceola Fundamental High School had the opportunity to have their works on display at the first “Art in the Park” event held on Saturday April 23^rd at Seminole City Park. The opportunity came about because, as Becky Gunter, City of Seminole Recreation Director explains, “We don’t have any art events and that was a goal of the City Council, so we wanted to create some events to meet that goal”.

Duane Crandall, City of Seminole Recreation Program Coordinator, shared the city’s desire to include student art: “When we came up with the idea for the ‘Art in the Park’ event, we knew we wanted to highlight youth art, including elementary, middle, and high school. This year we got Osceola Fundamental High School to participate, and in years to come we hope to have more participants representing youth art”.

As Mr. Theodore LoCascio, Fine Arts teacher at OFHS, recalls, “Duane contacted me… and he really wanted to represent student art”. The City of Seminole provided the pavilion for free for the student art display. “I started getting a lot of my work back from other art shows… so a lot of work hanging here are award-winning pieces,” Mr. LoCasico says, when explaining how he chose the pieces to put on display. He even had some of his own works on display.

OFHS students were among the 28 vendors participating in this event. Others displaying their works included Carla Mogan who specializes in photography. Mogan said this was the first time she was exhibiting her photos. “It was kind of strange,” she shared. “I just happened to look at some little paper that said they were looking for artists and I’ve never put my work out. It just seemed like the universe was guiding me. I was supposed to be here”. Mogan tells us how this event has helped her business: “It has given me excellent exposure. I have over 100 email addresses and I got everyone’s opinion… so I am going to really see what people like the most”.