Art Show and Demo on Gettys Square Art Oasis

We will have two very talented artists selling their work on the Art Oasis: Jill Rakowicz (Encaustic Painting) and Shawn Heiges (Ceramics).

Jill is an art educator in the Littlestown Area SD, Littlestown, PA. She teaches grades K-5 at Alloway Creek Elementary School. Each year, she teaches approximately 900 students and witnesses a multitude of artworks that begin as simple sketches and mark makings. Visually observing mark makings by her students, she builds upon layers of lines and shapes. In doing so, she discovers shapes and lines that meld into each other across the surface of the canvas. This often results in ritualistic mark making that generates newly invented subject matter. She holds a BA in Art from Shippensburg University, an Art Education Certification from Kutztown University, and a Master of Education in Educational Program Design from the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, PA. She has won Awards of Merit and Best in Show for her works in encaustic and has exhibited in Gettysburg, Chambersburg, Shippensburg, State College, Lancaster, and York, PA.

Ceramic artist Shawn Heiges is inspired by the interdependent and changing communities of the natural world. She focuses on creating organic vessels and groupings connected by their shared environment and shifting life cycles: birth, growth, degeneration, and death. Ultimately, outdoor raku and barrel firings transform the clay color and surface of her work, yielding vivid hues and/or charring the clay body to appear aged and fossilized.