Sarah Carlson, a senior at Charles Henderson High School, has been named the recipient of the 2018 Jean Lake Scholarship, which is presented annually by the Troy Arts Council.

The scholarship is named in memory of nationally acclaimed Troy artist Jean Lake and is awarded to a local high school senior who has exceptional artistic talent and plans to continue his or her art education in college.

Charlotte Walden, CHHS art teacher, said Sarah is very deserving of the $2,000 scholarship.

“Art comes naturally for Sarah,” Walden said. “She has a personal connection with her artwork. She is not afraid to try new ideas and techniques. She is an avid sketcher and has shown tremendous growth as an artist, as exampled by her concentration pieces, which won her the scholarship.”
Walden said Sarah’s concentration pieces demonstrated the breadth of her work and the diversity of her technique, subject matter and conceptual ideas.

“As her teacher, her work moved me,” Walden said.

Sarah expressed appreciation to the Troy Arts Council for the confidence placed in her and her abilities with the awarding of the scholarship.

“I was not expecting to win because there are other senior art students that are so talented,” she said. “The scholarship is a great honor and I want to thank the Troy Arts Council for giving me this opportunity.”

Sarah said her interest in art could be traced back to when she was only a toddler.

“My uncle and my dad got me interested in art,” she said. “My uncle is a freelance artist. He designs logos and creates art for Christian books for children. My dad majored in art so they were the ones that influenced me, and, too, I just love art.”

As an Advanced Placement art student, Sarah was required to include concentration pieces in her art portfolio.

The concentration pieces were to demonstrate knowledge of a subject and convey that understanding to those who viewed the artwork.

Sarah’s idea for her concentration pieces was founded in her interest in mental disorders and how they affect people differently.

“I wanted to create feeling with the use of color but I used gray spray paint for the backgrounds to show the darkness and unhappiness that mental disorders cause,” Sarah said. “Someone with a mental disorder can be happy and then suddenly sad.”

She illustrated the mood swings that can occur when one is dealing with a mental disorder with a watercolor of a jellyfish and rocks.

“The jellyfish is fluid and the rock are hard,” she said. “That’s how it can be with mental illnesses, from good times to hard times.”

Sarah painted a dog, penned Geisha girls and illustrated a folktale as ways of telling the story of mental disorders through art.

She plans to first attend Troy University and later Auburn University and pursue a degree in veterinary science.

She hopes to open a veterinary practice that will be artistically designed and aesthetically pleasing for the comfort of the animals.