Visual & Performing Arts: Discover Your Creativity!

The arts encourage us to look inward and outward, to honor tradition and to break new ground, and to find our place in a richer world. Beyond taking a wide variety of courses in GSA's Visual and Performing Arts Department, our students explore their creativity through our award-winning extracurricular arts programs.

We've got the music in us! As members of our steel band ensembles, the GSA Concert Band, and the GSA Jazz Band and jazz combos, our students grow as performers and share their love of music with the community in a wide range of public performances, such as our Winter Concert, our Spring Concert, the Blue Hill Fair, the Blue Hill Memorial Day parade, varsity basketball games, and in regional, state, and national competition. Martin Conte '11 teaches steel band, and Phelan Gallagher '02 directs our other music ensembles.

All the world's a stage. To have fun, to grow as actors, and to strengthen their abilities to be truthful, brave, bold, flexible on stage and in front of a camera are the goals of the Thespians of GSA, directed by Erin McCormick '00. Most years, the Thespians mount a fall play and compete in the state Drama Festival in spring. They also have shifted to more video production.

A picture is worth a thousand words. A big part of GSA's reputation for arts excellence comes from the strengths of our diverse visual arts courses. Students in those courses show their artwork in public exhibits, such as the Student Art Show at the Blue Hill Public Library. Beyond those courses, many students participate in the September Studio Based Learning program at the nearby Haystack Mountain School of Crafts, or Haystack’s follow-up mentor program. ALL GSA students explore their creative interests in our Spring Arts Festival. Find out about these opportunities from VPA Department Chair Melissa Rioux '01.

Learn more about our visual and performing arts events HERE!