“It has to have meaning” – Gary Joshua Weyandt

 

Penn State Altoona student Gary Joshua Weyandt recently told the Collegiate Review what it is like to be involved in the campus Visual Arts Studies program.

 

The VAS program has options such as painting, drawing, and even “new media” or “computer media,” which is what Weyandt is focusing on.

 

The junior from Osceola Mills, Pa., said that he highly recommends the program on campus if students have a passion for art.

 

“Only get into it if you’re serious about art … It’s a very good program,” he said. “Something that you’re going to get here that you’re not going to with some of the bigger art programs with some other campuses is you get a lot of one on one time with the professors.”

 

Weyandt said he has learned throughout his years in the VAS program that art isn’t simply paint on paper, it has to have some kind of meaning behind it.

 

“You can’t just plop something on a page and say, ‘oh, this is art,’” Weyandt said. “There has to be a reason for it and I find that’s actually a lot of the problems with modern art or contemporary art. It can come from anywhere, it can be anything, but it has to have meaning.”

 

Some of Weyandt’s most recent projects are his video “Miner Depression,” which can be seen on his Facebook page, and a video about children being bullied. The video about childhood bullies is still in progress but those interested can check out Weyandt’s perspective on how children see their bullies as monsters on his Facebook page here.

 

Weyandt also finds that art can be beneficial to his other academics outside of his major.

 

“Drawing helps me focus,” Weyandt said. “I find myself doodling in class since I was very young. I remember one time I was in math class … I had a higher grade in the class … and my teacher came over and said, ‘okay you’re not allowed to doodle anymore because you have this high grade. If you stop doodling you’re going to do better’ and my grade dropped because I was falling asleep. [Drawing] kept me awake, it kept me paying attention.”

 

Weyandt said that his goal for the future is to work for Pixar Animation but would also be happy with doing character design for video games.

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