This Thursday, March 16th, 150 students will have artwork installed at Reading Terminal Market for Friends Select’s annual Sights on Site art exhibition. The exhibition will be up through April 3rd behind the Miller’s Twist wall on the north side of the terminal. Artworks of students of first through twelfth grades will be displayed in a grid of 6″ x 6″ canvases.

Sights on Site is FSS’s annual art exhibit in which art students from lower, middle, and upper school are given assignments geared towards the history and cultural role of specific locations in the city. This year, the school has partnered with Reading Terminal Market, and art pieces reflect the location’s vibrant small shops. 

“One main goal of the program each year  is for art students to learn by immersing themselves in the history, architecture, or cultural context of the institution,” explains Upper School art teacher Deborah Caiola. For example, when we partnered with PAFA and the site was  the Furness-Hewitt museum of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, one of Deborah’s class’ assignments was to create paintings inspired by the  Gothic architecture of the museum. 

Another goal is to create a collaborative and “dynamic” exhibition, with students of various ages creating all kinds of artwork focused around the same idea and place, whether it’s a copper plate from an advanced metalsmithing class or an oil pastel painting from a lower school class. 

There will be a reception on Thursday, March 16, from 4:30-6:30 P.M. to celebrate students and their newly stationed artwork. “There’s a real fruition that can occur visually and in life, because you have younger and older students working on the same project. The younger students can see the work of the older students– bigger Friends Select students  they might  become one day, ” Deborah explains. “Then artistically, you have a show with one central theme that has work of  little kid hands mixed with those of metalsmiths or advanced digital artists.” All are welcome to come to the opening event and support the hard work students have put in this winter. If you are unable to attend the reception, make sure you visit Reading Terminal Market in the next two weeks, enjoying one of Philly’s greatest attractions while admiring some incredible student artwork.