In August, Alyssa McRoberts ‘24 embarked on a collaborative project with Tom Tsuchiya and a team of Mount St. Joseph University students that will be a fun and interactive part of this year’s BLINK Cincinnati.
Tom Tsuchiya, a featured artist with BLINK and the first to have a permanent sculpture in Cincinnati, was the mentor/guide to the group. Alyssa and the team from the Mount are thrilled to work with Tom and BLINK to create this magnificent dragon symbolizing good fortune and prosperity, and a positive force in spiritual journeys.
Over the summer, Alyssa worked as the Teaching Artist for the Summer Teacher Institute at the Cincinnati Art Museum. During the institute, she reconnected with local artist Tom Tsuchiya, who had taught the Sustainable Sculpture class at Mount St. Joseph University, a class that Alyssa had taken. Part of the class included Alyssa having her parrot sculpture exhibited at the Cincinnati Zoo celebrating Earth Day. During their conversation, Tom invited Alyssa to collaborate with him on a sculpture for BLINK, specifically for Asianati, featuring a Chinese dragon. Asianati will host a Night Food Market at BLINK where the sustainable sculpture dragon created by Alyssa and her team and mentored by Tom will make its appearance.
In photo: MSJ art students in process of creating sustainable dragon sculpture for BLINK.
Alyssa assembled a team of senior art education students—Alexa Theuerling, Mia Smith, Samantha Munyon, and MinAsia Truong—who had also taken Tom’s Sustainable Sculpture class. Together, they set out to create a 25-foot dragon sculpture made primarily from sustainable and recyclable materials, which they collected from the Cincinnati Recycling Hub.
Despite only having weekends to work on the project due to their other commitments—Alyssa, an art teacher at St. Catharine of Siena, and the rest of the team at school here at the Mount—the group worked to bring their vision to life. The finished piece will be displayed near Court Street during BLINK Cincinnati, highlighting not only their artistic talents but also their commitment to environmental consciousness.
Make sure to stop by and experience this awe-inspiring dragon, a true fusion of creativity and sustainability!