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CRANBURY – Student wins special art award

By David Kilby, Staff Writer
   CRANBURY — Allison Miezin, 17, of Cranbury, is one of a chosen few award winners who will receive a Student Arts Excellence Award from VSA New Jersey next week for her artistic achievements.
   Only seven students in the state have received this recognition, according to a press release from the organization.
   What makes this award more unique is the fact that Allison has attention deficit disorder.
   She said she doesn’t really know what to think of the award she is receiving.
   ”I’m a little nervous because I don’t think of myself as worthy of an award,” she said. “It’s a little shocking. I’ve always been the quiet one in the background and I’m okay with that.”
   Art is just a personal means of expression for her, she explained.
   ”I just have the urge to be creative and if I don’t get the chance I get frustrated,” she said.
   VSA New Jersey is a nonprofit statewide organization that provides arts programming for people with disabilities, will honor the recipients of the 2011 Arts Achievement Awards next Saturday at 2 p.m. at the Linwood Middle School in North Brunswick.
   VSA (Vision, Strength and Artistic Expression) is an international organization founded in the mid 1970s by Jean Kennedy Smith, who was United States’ ambassador to Ireland in the 1990’s.
   The organization’s mission is to provide arts and education opportunities for people with disabilities and increase access to the arts for all, reads the website, www.vsarts.org.
   The annual Arts Achievement Awards recognize students with disabilities ages 14 to 21 who demonstrate outstanding involvement in the arts and educators and administrators who have established high quality arts programs for young people with disabilities, states a press release announcing the award winners.
   Looking around her home on Danser Drive reveals an expression of art through many outlets including her own paintings, duffel bags, back packs, dresses, drawings, clay sculptures and pottery.
   She has also made clay bead bracelets for her friends, and clothes made by her are worn all around town.
   Allison’s favorite art form is sewing, and she will be attending Philadelphia University next year, where she will study fashion design.
   She said she used to be a part of Cranbury School art teacher Tamara Woronczuk’s art club.
   ”It went until 4:30 p.m., and she (Ms. Woronczuk) stayed almost until 5:30 working on art with me. It was nice,” Allison said.
   Judy Buckley, her present art teacher at Princeton High School, also has been a motivator for Allison and was the one who nominated for Allison for the award.
   Allison, who has attention deficit disorder, said she likes art because she is a very hands-on person, and loves using her hands to form and shape things to express herself.
   ”That’s why we need art, so we can have tangible things,” she said.
   She even has a trademark, the squirrel, which she has chosen since it’s different and interesting, she said. She has drawn a few dozen squirrels, each squirrel having its own theme, such as “ninja squirrel”, “giant squirrel”, “zebra squirrel”, “underwater squirrel” and “furry squirrel”. She places her squirrel trademark on the clothes she makes.
   Allison, who also plays on the Princeton High School Little Tigers hockey team, said she used to teach a sewing class to second and third graders and her friends before breaking her arm in ice hockey.
   When the team was going through financial hardship, Allison helped raise money. For example, at a car wash fundraiser the team attracted customers by wearing animal costumes made by Allison.
   She has also made several dresses for herself and her friends, This year, she made a prom dress for one of her friends, and her sewing students are using book bags that she helped them make during her sewing class.
   ”Recently I’ve been surprising myself with the art I’ve been doing,” she said.
   She made her first dress in sixth grade for her mother, who then wore the dress to a formal dinner.
   People in the neighborhood know she is a good sewer so they often come to her and ask her to fix rips in their clothes, she said.
   Even though she’s going in to fashion and design and even though she makes all sorts of apparel, she said she really isn’t the fashionable type.
   ”I don’t really care what I wear,” she said.
   For those who need encouragement in their artistic pursuits, she had a bit of advice.
   ”There’s no limit to how good you can get if you keep practicing,” she said. “Whatever you see, just try to draw it. It’s not going to come out the way you see it the first time, but eventually it will.”