By Nick Stern, Senior Reporter
This year CNM is planning to host the Second Annual Digital Design Showcase on the second floor of the Student Resources Center in the Richard Barr Boardroom, Full-time Faculty member of the Business Information and Technology Department Sonia Crawford said.
Crawford said the showcase is a three hour event that will happen on Good Friday April 18 from 1 p.m. until 4 p.m. and she encourages everyone and anyone to show up, eat some food, and enjoy the awesome work that will be on display.
The Digital Design Showcase will give students from Crawford’s and other instructor’s digital media classes the opportunity to show people their art and feel proud of their achievements, she said.
“Essentially the showcase is going to be a poster session. Students are going to have black presentation boards which they are going to print all of their work on and then display it in that room so people can walk around and look at their artwork. It is open to the CNM community, Albuquerque community, and everyone. It is just open to everybody,” Crawford said.
Crawford came up with the idea for the first Digital Design Showcase during the 2013 spring semester and believes it can benefit the community immensely and she hopes to have a bigger and better one every year to eventually use as a catalyst for students to get notice and even get into internships or employment, she said.
The showcase is intended to honor the participating artists and get their work out in the public eye and many of the student artists involved in the showcase will also be graduating this semester, so the event is a great way to recognize the work and the progress that has been made, and will be made by all of them on their journeys through college and life, she said.
“The way that I always think about these artists is that it is not just about what they have created this term, but it is sort of everything that has brought them to this point. It is all their talent sort get better and better with time,” she said. of culminating and they just
Being able to push one’s work out in to the community and be seen is a very important part of graphic design and art in general but it is also a very satisfying and good feeling when people see someone’s work and are actually excited or impressed by it, Crawford said.
That is why the showcase is such an important experience to the artists involved, and since many artists are instilled with a sense of self-doubt about their own art and even their artistic capabilities in general, it is helpful when people see the work of a self-doubting artist and are openly impressed because it improves the artist’s mindset and helps them realize their work is good, Crawford said.
“It is validating for them to see their own work on display and have the community see the work and be like ‘oh wow, look at what you did’ or ‘ how did you do that?’ so I really think the students are the center of the showcase and the focus is totally on them and their work,” she said.
People who are undecided about what field they might be interested in can also benefit greatly by the showcase because by going to it they will be able to see what digital media is really all about, what cool stuff they could possibly be getting in toGr and whether that is their cup of tea or not, Crawford said.
It is basically like an art opening that is a one-time deal until next year and Crawford encourages everyone who is even remotely interested to show up and see what it is all about and she also claimed that many of her students are truly amazing at what they do and their art real truly amaze, she said.
The idea and purpose of the showcase revolves around the best advice that Crawford can give all art students which is to always show their work any way they can to get recognized and get their work out in public, she said.
“What graphic designers do not understand is that they think they go to the work but often it is the other way around. People come to them because of their work. So I am surfing the internet and I see someone’s work and say ‘they are amazing! I want them to design my logo for me, my presence package, my website, or whatever.’ It is important for artists and designers to get their work out there so people can see it and come to them for it,” she said.