Life-like puppets hang from the ceilings while large colorful paintings, photographs, graphic designs and drawings brighten the white walls throughout the room. Metal jewelry, glazed ceramic dishes, bronze casting pieces and various clay sculptures fill cases on the display floor.

While each piece of art featured in the Art Gallery takes on its own meaning, it was created by the hands of students.

This year’s Student Show will display more than 175 pieces of art to the campus community through May 31.

“This student body is just outrageously talented and some of these students have never made art before,” Susanna Meiers, director and curator of the Art Gallery, said.

The Student Show represents what is being taught at EC and includes both two-dimensional and three-dimensional techniques, Meiers said.

The opening reception for the exhibit will take place from 6 to 9 p.m. tomorrow in the Art Gallery.

On top of all the artwork featured in the exhibit, the reception will consist of various student art demonstrations and presentations.

Some students will draw still life art, while others will demonstrate bronze casting.

The art department, which is the largest department in the fine arts division with more than 2,700 art students enrolled this semester, together with Meiers, plans the annual student show during the spring.

Art professors take on the task of choosing the two best student pieces from each of the classes they teach to be featured in the exhibit.

“The screening process is a challenge for students but it exposes them to a whole new media, range, discipline, and possibilities,” Willie Brownlee, art professor, said. “It gives students a better sense of what the art world is about; I think that it has definitely improved and the work is more sophisticated.”

Remaining student artwork that isn’t on display in the Art Gallery can be seen hanging from the walls of the Arts and Behavioral Sciences Building on campus for the rest of the semester.

“A lot of the instruction that takes place in the Art department is trying to make options available to the students,” Constance Fitzsimons, dean of the fine arts division, said.

“It’s not necessarily always about trying to get your work into a commercial art gallery or museum, but may also contribute to a field you could get a job in and make money at so they could apply their creative skills in that way,” she added.

During the exhibit’s reception, the art department will also have an open house titled “The Art Happening,” which will include food, refreshments and a musical performance from EC’s guitar ensemble under the direction of Christopher Mello, music instructor.

“(The reception and open house) gives everybody a good picture as to what the students are doing and what kind of work they’re focused on,” Fitzsimons said.

There will also be special presentations on 3D computer animation, motion graphics, web design and other multimedia in different rooms throughout the Arts and Behavioral Sciences Building.

“The Art Gallery dates as far back as the 1960s.” Brownlee said. “It’s more formal than ever and the open house has been a 15 to 20 year proposition.”

The annual student show is a highly anticipated exhibit among the fine arts division and its students.

“It’s an honor for them to have their work in the gallery.” Meiers said. “Students do incredibly good work and the level of quality is so good.”