From the depths into the blue: 10-minute sketch swims off page, flies to stunning victory

A 10-minute sketch is all it took for the Encampment School art program to win $5,000 at the state art symposium in Casper.

The sketch, a trout-shaped World War II bomber dreamt up by Encampment School senior A.J. Kuster, was later used as a concept for the “Traveling Trout” competition sponsored by the National Museum of Wildlife Art.

For the competition, high school art programs across Wyoming were set with the same task – breathe life into a white, trout-shaped piece of fiberglass.

Kuster, along with other art students, submitted several designs for the project. The design Encampment art teacher Pam Kraft selected was Kuster’s, a sketch he completed in 10 minutes before the project was due.

“I was just trying to get my last design in before we ran out of time, and it just worked out really good,” Kuster said. “I was sitting there thinking of one more idea, because she wanted us to turn in a few, so I was just goofing off and decided to draw that, and it turned out that was the one that was picked.”

Kraft, with the help of an anonymous assistant, carefully observed each design drawn up by Encampment art students, Kraft said.

“They had to produce designs that they thought they would like to apply to the surface of this trout,” Kraft said. “I spent time going over the designs with my advisor and together we made the decision.”

Kraft felt Kuster’s 10-minute sketch was the best design.

“From that point on, A.J. became the art director because it was his design,” Kraft said.

The sketch may have only taken Kuster 10 minutes to complete, but the task of applying the design to the fish took several months.

“I thought it would have been a lot easier than it was, but there is a lot of things that go into making something like that,” Kuster said.

Kuster and his team started the project by crafting wings for the design. After the wings were attached, Kuster and other students spent hours upon hours cutting and placing aluminum to the fish to give it a plane look.

“The most time-consuming part was cutting out rectangular shapes of heavy-duty aluminum foil and pounding rivets into it,” Kuster said. “That was probably the most difficult part of the whole process.”

The finished product was titled “Metaporphofish”, a design that represented both, a trout and a World War II bomber.

The design starts off as a bomber at the nose, but slowly transforms into a trout as the design descends to the tail.

Although Kuster and other art students spent months working on the fish, he still was not certain if “Metaporphofish” would place.

“We knew it looked good, but we didn’t know if it was good enough,” Kuster said.

After much suspense, Encampment’s design took second.

“The first-place fish scored 119 points. We scored 118 points, so it was very close,” Kraft said.

Encampment School did very well in the overall state art competition with 30 blue ribbons to go along with 39 submissions.

“We had the highest percentage of blue ribbons of any school in the state,” Kraft said.

Kuster said Encampment School has always done well in art programs, but this year was a bit better.

“We are right around there every year, but this year was pretty exceptional because of the fish and all the blue ribbons everyone earned,” Kuster said.

Among Encampment School students who were successful in the competition was one more “champion” – Jennifer Morgan who won six blue ribbons with six submissions, more ribbons than any other student from Encampment School. However, the junior’s success didn’t end there.

“Jennifer was not only our top ribbon winner, but she also won the Artistic Discovery Award,” Kraft said.

The Artistic Discovery Award is congressional recognition of 25 pieces out of 4,000 at the state art symposium.

“They select from that massive amount 25 pieces to represent the best of the show in the artistic discovery show,” Kraft said.

Morgan’s piece was a print of a skeleton with a scarf and other small details.

Morgan’s print will be displayed in a special exhibit in Cheyenne along with 24 other pieces.

“She had a phenomenal state art and she’s only a junior,” Kraft said.