» By TIFFANY COMER – tcomer@my.apsu.edu
Every year the Clarksville Economic Development Council holds a contest for the Rivers and Spires yearly poster. This year, the council decided they wanted more students involved, which led to an APSU Design Center class composing and submitting entries for the 2013 Rivers and Spires festival. Student Lucas Freeze’s design was ultimately selected.
In early January, representatives of the festival met with the students and pitched their ideas of what they wanted captured in the final piece of artwork.
Students of the class were each given the task of coming up with concepts for the poster, which would be edited and reviewed before the final submissions.
Once final drafts of the projects were completed, they were placed in the Trahern Building Gallery in late February.
“Working with the Design Center students was a new process for us this year, and it has worked out very well. We were very pleased with the quality of work we received and are looking forward to pursuing this project with them again next year,” said festival director Doug Barber.
The Development Council came to APSU on Tuesday, March 27, to announce and congratulate the winner of the 2013 poster design contest.
Barber told the students before announcing the winner, “We went back and forth between several pieces because we were pleased with all the work. You all have incredible talent and we didn’t want to make a hasty decision.”
He said elements could have been taken from all of this year’s designs, because the submissions were just that good.
Class members who submitted artwork were Theresa Biermann, Lucas Freeze, Steven Lafferty, Susan Liberatore, Briana MacArthur, Oscar Quintanilla and Danielle Spoon. When Freeze’s name was called, he was speechless and didn’t seem to believe he was the winner.
He told the staff it had been a pleasure designing with them.
After the announcement, Barber presented the APSU Design Center, as well as Freeze, with a check for the winning design.
Freeze said the inspiration for the design just came to him, and that he “wanted to do something imaginative and different from years past.”
This year’s Rivers and Spires festival will be Thursday, April 19 through Saturday, April 21 in downtown Clarksville, and the festival may see more student-designed posters in future years. According to Barber, “We were very pleased with the quality of work we received and are looking forward to pursuing this project with them again next year.” TAS
