Cathleen Allison/Nevada Appeal Lisa Sheppard shows off some of her artwork being displayed at the Western Nevada Community College Recycled Art(icles) Show. Winners will be announced at tonight's artist reception. Her entries include bead-covered bowling balls and her husband, Phil's, beer bottle cap-covered bowling ball.
The recycled-art show at Western Nevada Community College is a family affair for the Sheppard clan of Carson City.
"I've been doing (the art show) since 1999, believe it or not," said mom Lisa Sheppard. "The first year, I had an idea about taking old CDs and cracking them and throwing them on canvas. The next year, I actually sold my first piece for $125. I did a bigger cracked-CD piece, and a lady bought it and put it in her office."
Her daughter Sierra, 8, who won an honorable mention two years ago in the contest, will be going to Western Nevada Community College's Recycled Art(icles) reception tonight, along with Sheppard and her husband, Phil, who entered two pieces this year.
The artwork, which must be made of previously used materials, will be on display in the gallery of the Bristlecone Building at WNCC through April 29.
Awards given tonight will be $100 for best of show, $75 for first place, most creative, and first place, most useful; $50 for second place, most creative and most useful; $25 for third; and honorable mentions in those two categories. According to Julia Lewis DeWitt, a WNCC admission and records employee who oversees the contest, more than 60 pieces were entered.
"We have quite a few pieces from an art class at Dayton High School and from an art class at UNR," she said. "Anything goes - it's open to absolutely anyone who wants to enter."
Sheppard's projects include a piece called "Time To Make a Call," a wall clock with a light blue face surrounded by silver cell phones, which sold for $25. Her other entries, "Bloomin' Ball" and "Beads of Fandango," are bowling ball art, which can be used for lawn ornamentation.
"You can't really tell what colors the balls are underneath with all the beads put around them," she said.
Her husband's pieces are a wall clock called, "A Bic in Time," which has Bic lighters glued to the edges, and a bowling ball called "Ball Beering," covered in beer caps.
The art contest began 10 years ago as an idea of now-retired art instructor Harold LaVigne and WNCC Public Service Librarian Valerie Andersen.
"(Harold) shared a story with me about picking up discarded items on the city streets in San Francisco and using them to make objects of art," Andersen said Wednesday.
"Since we had just initiated a recycling program at the college, (we) thought it would be a fun way to highlight our program. We were thrilled when we received around 35 entries the first year."
Contest judges were Becky Stock, Nevada Land Conservancy's project coordinator; Christi Cakiroglu, executive director of Keep Truckee Meadows Beautiful; and Tami Jesch, trash lady for Keep Truckee Meadows Beautiful.
"(The show) has been a blast," Andersen said. "It's been so much fun to see all the things people come up with and where they find their inspiration."
n Contact reporter Maggie O'Neill at moneill@nevadaappeal.com or 881-1219.
If you go
What: Recycled Art(icles) Show artists' reception. David Friedman, Nevada's recycling coordinator with the Nevada Department of Environmental Protection, will speak.
Refreshments will be served.
When: 5:30-7:30 tonight. Entries will be displayed through April 29.
Where: Gallery of the Bristlecone Building at Western Nevada Community College, 2201 W. College Parkway
Information: 445-3274.