W.G. Sanders Middle School student Lillian Hauck may only be in sixth grade, but she’s already become a familiar face in Columbia’s art scene. She has participated in the Cottontown Art Crawl for the last four years and her artwork was featured in the NoMa Warehouse.
Lillian became interested in art when she was eight years old. She says her mother encouraged her to open her own space at the Cottontown Art Crawl and introduced her to other local artists.
“I became interested in art because of the activities I did with my mom and because of the Art Crawl and the things I saw happening in my community, so I decided to participate in it,” Lillian said.
The Cottontown Art Crawl allows nearly 200 local artists to showcase and sell their work along Columbia’s Bellevue Historic District. This year’s event was held March 10.
Lillian started off by selling watercolor art, but she has since transitioned to acrylics and landscapes. She says her grandfather got her interested in acrylics and landscapes.
“It’s really fun to share a hobby with my grandfather. I’ve been painting side by side with him. He taught me different techniques like ocean waves and things like that,” Lillian said. “I have one of his paintings in my room, which is a painting of Mount Fuji. It has the cherry trees in it and the mountain in the background.”
As a student in Richland One’s Middle School Montessori program, Lillian is often able to use her artistic skills on class assignments. For example, she is working on a project in her ELA class to represent symbolism. Lillian was tasked to create a painting for one of the symbols in the book that she and her classmates read.
“I’m really excited to be able to incorporate painting into ELA,” she said.
Lillian is also involved in a watercolor club at W.G. Sanders, where she learns how to improve her watercolor painting skills and express herself.
“The first day, we got to learn different watercolor techniques, like a wet on dry or you can sprinkle salt and it’ll make it look like stars,” she said.
Lillian says art will always play a big role in her life and education, even if she decides not to pursue a career path in it.
“I love art because it’s an awesome thing to do. You get to focus on the details. It’s really calming and you get to share something like that with everyone else,” she said.
