Warwick Valley student artist of the week: Sanfordville Elementary fourth-grader Matthew Cuesta

‘Art does help with school work. For me, the creativity helps with creative writing.’

Sanfordville Elementary fourth-grader Matthew Cuesta likes to sketch in his free time and feels sketching offers him an opportunity to address all his “crazy ideas.” 

“I have a lot of paper and I want to use it for something like this,” he said. “Sketching allows people to draw what they want and it allows people to get all their crazy ideas out. And I really like to draw.”

Leah Mednick, his art teacher, sees how much Matthew enjoys drawing.

“Matthew is always happy to come to art class where he can express his talents,” she said. “He is hardworking and he is not afraid to try new things. Matthew has excellent drawing skills which he applies to all his art project.”

Mrs. Mednick noted “Matthew is ‘the student’ that is always drawing.”

“He takes pride in his work,” she added. “His favorite thing to draw is people. He works hard at everything he does and is always willing to try something new or help out a friend. His drawing skills are always improving, as he is constantly evaluating what he does. Matthew pays attention to detail. His expressive figure drawings are full of life and skill.”

These are the reasons why Matthew is this week’s Warwick Valley student artist of the week.

Scribbling is art

Matthew is also a fan of the abstract art of scribbling and connected the importance of scribbling with drawing.

“Scribbling helps me to think about more ideas to draw about,” he said. “And then, I’ll do  thumbnail pictures of what my drawing might look like. The one thumbnail I like best is what I will end up drawing.”

Matthew – who said he favorite medium is pencil — believes the creativity shown in artwork can be transferred to academics.

“Art does help with school work,” he said.  “For me, the creativity helps with creative writing.”

Creating unfinished works

Like any artist, Matthew explained he has his own unique style.   

“Most of my drawings are not finished because I don’t like doing finished pieces,” he said. “Plus, I don’t like to usually color stuff. Usually, finished pieces have color.”

If Matthew becomes a famous artist someday, his unfinished works may join the ranks of notable unfinished works such as Gilbert Stuart’s portrait of George Washington, or Leonardo da Vinci’s “St. Jerome in the Wilderness.”

But for now, Matthew is thinking about becoming a scientist. However, he plans to continue creating art in his free time.

Whether it’s science or art, Matthew stressed both shared a common bond: Creative problem solving.

“If you have something to do and you don’t know the answer to it,” he added, “you can be creative and think of ideas to solve the problem.”