Every year Drury hosts an art competition to highlight the top artists from all over the state of Missouri. Rolla High School freshman Seth Kuhlman recently sent his art piece off to compete in Drury University’s sixth annual Best of the Midwest High School Competitive Exhibition.
“Drury University reaches out to high school art teachers all across Missouri… Through an email I saw that Drury University was having an art exhibition… They have a competition where they will select Best in Show, who will receive a scholarship,” stated Engelbrecht.
Engelbrecht pushes many students towards competitions.
“The competitions are a little bit daunting,” said Engelbrecht. “They have to be pretty confident and ready for a challenge, in order to actually participate in these competitions. I just shared this art competition with all of my advanced students, and Seth said, ‘I will do it.’ I gave him a day’s notice, so he didn’t have any time to prepare a special work of art. He used something he had just finished, so it was appropriate timing for Seth.”
Engelbrecht meticulously looks for students to participate in competitions.
“I look for students who already have a body of work that they can pull from. I look for students who are interested, engaged in art, and I look for students who
think about these competitions as being fun, not something that’s overwhelming,” said Engelbrecht.
Kuhlman is currently in Engelbrecht’s art class.
“Well, I’m taking advanced 2D art this year. The same for next semester. I like to do 2D a little better than 3D,” Kuhlman said.
Kuhlman has been at the high school for only four months and his growth is being recognized.
“He is growing in his ability to recreate proportions of the face to recreate the colors that he sees or even to interpret the color in his own palettes, which is very exciting. He’s beginning to explore relationships of objects to the faces, so that the whole composition is becoming more complex.” stated Engelbrecht. “Just naturally, Seth is excited about drawing. He really is having fun with making those illusions of faces on the page. He’s very passionate about it right now and enjoying the process.”

Kuhlman began creating art at a young age, and has continued his passion for drawing as he has grown.
“I started drawing, maybe in second grade, but I mean, I was good at drawing stick figures,” said Kuhlman. “I remember in third grade I watched YouTube tutorials like how to draw things, and I obviously [was] really bad, but I didn’t care. I just kept on drawing those things that I knew how to draw.”