It is one thing to receive recognition for a special piece of artwork – it is another for it to earn a spot for display in Washington, D.C.
Philip Simmons High 11th grader Eden Tumey has earned top honors in the Congressional Art Competition, winning for South Carolina’s District 1. This is an annual high school arts showcase where winning student pieces are displayed in the U.S. Capitol for one year. Students submit entries to their representative’s office, and panels of district artists select the winning entries.
Tumey will make a trip to Washington, D.C. this summer for the unveiling of artwork, which depicts a hunting dog retrieving a rabbit. The piece is made out of soft pastel pencils on a stained wooden board.
Her artwork is inspired by Tumey’s own dog, a female German shorthair named Greta. Tumey is an Advanced Placement 2D Art student who has always been fascinated by predators and the eco system. Her family is very outdoorsy and have always taken their dogs on hunting excursions outside of Francis Marion.
Tumey said this was actually the hardest piece she has ever completed because it took so long to get the proportions correct. Greta is a 3-year-old dog that is skilled at fetching ducks, doves and, of course, rabbits, but Tumey’s artwork is based more so of a memory of Greta’s first hunting trip when she was still a puppy. Unfortunately, Tumey did not have a photo of Greta from that particular excursion, so she had to use eight different pictures of dogs and combined them in her head to create the image she wanted.
While familiar with paint sketches, Tumey also wanted to try a medium she had never done before, and had to jump through some hoops to make the dog’s hair look realistic. She ended up using an entire tray of soft pastel pencils, and also had to experiment with different oils before transitioning to liquid water colors to get the pastels to stick to the wood. The whole project took about a month to complete. However, she enjoyed working with the soft pastels so much that it has since inspired her to try out different mediums and other surface material.
“It was a big process and a learning curve to make that,” she said. “A lot went into it to make it.”
Philip Simmons High visual arts teacher Paige Duvall tries to get students to submit artwork into the Congressional Art Competition every year, and encouraged Tumey to submit her piece about Greta. Tumey has always referred to the work as “My Greta Piece” but its official title is “Dawn in the Cutover,” a reference to the early hours of the day when people typically go hunting as well as the area of land where timber has recently been harvested.
Tumey submitted the artwork for the contest earlier this semester and said she was shocked when she heard she had won for District 1.
“It made me appreciate my piece a lot more,” she said, adding that she is excited to head to Washington, D.C. this summer – especially with the country celebrating its 250th birthday this year. “I love it up there – I really want to get into college up there.”
Tumey plans to take AP Drawing next year, which would allow her to still use pastels. She is a very active student at Philip Simmons High, participating in Beta Club, the recycling club, National Honor Society, National Art Honor Society and Spanish National Honor Society. She also volunteers with beach cleanups, and a highlight of her year is when she gets to help make playhouses for children through Habitat for Humanity. She is also a babysitter.
Tumey really wants to study law and political science at Georgetown University, but is also open to studying architecture at Clemson University. After college, she really aspires to operate an art gallery in downtown Charleston.
She is the daughter of John and Jenny Tumey.