AMHERST — An annual art exhibit by eighth graders at the Amherst Regional Middle School, staged to recognize International Human Rights Day, is being hosted online this year at the Jones Library.
The exhibit of art and poetry, normally displayed in the library’s atrium, is part of a project from the students’ social studies classes, in which they study the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the U.S. Constitution, notably the Preamble and Bill of Rights of the latter document.
International Human Rights Day is Dec. 10, recognizing the day in 1948 when the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
For the exhibit, which features 150 works, students chose one of the documents and then created artworks that pertain to specific parts of the selected document.
This year students have employed “Blackout Poetry,” taking text from the documents and blacking out certain words and phrases to create a new poetic form with the remaining words. Some also add accompanying drawings.
The project is coordinated by teacher Irene LaRoche and Martha Spiegelman, a local chapter coordinator for Amnesty International.
The artworks can be viewed through Dec. 31 at joneslibrary.org/humanrightsartexhibit.
Steve Pfarrer can be reached at spfarrer@gazettenet.com.