Arts Student of the Week: Khai Dang-Lee

Niwot High School freshman Khai Dang-Lee grew interested in art when their mother showed Dang-Lee her own old sketches. "She is an amazing artist and seeing her beautiful work inspired me to make my own," Dang-Lee said. "It was around fourth grade, the beginning of COVID. I loved art class at Eisenhower Elementary. It was mostly very short fun projects, but it was my favorite class then. At Manhattan Middle School art was more advanced, and we had longer projects. Sixth grade is when I started being more serious about art and making more projects on my own. I really loved colored pencils and painting then, too."

Dang-Lee appreciates what they learned from their art teacher there. "She was very nice and gave great advice," Dang-Lee said. Their teacher encouraged them to work outside their comfort zone. She taught Dang-Lee the combination of watercolor and colored pencils which Dang-Lee loves to use for landscapes.

At the time, Dang-Lee submitted two pieces for a "teens and under" art gallery, and Dang-Lee was nominated twice for some of their pieces to be shown at the Boulder Public Library in sixth and seventh grade. Their teacher submitted one of Dang-Lee's pieces to be shown at the district office. She also nominated Dang-Lee for a "Rise" Award for Excellence in Art.

NHS arts educator Crystal Hinds selected Dang-Lee as Arts Student of the Week. "Khai is a very quiet individual, but creates amazing pieces, and is pleasant to everyone," Hinds said.

Dang-Lee shared the sentiment. "My teacher, Ms. Hinds, is very kind and helpful, and I like the community," Dang-Lee said. "I have made a lot of friends in the NHS art community."

Although Dang-Lee doesn't have a favorite artist, they admire Vincent van Gogh and Frida Kahlo. They love Van Gogh's art style, and his use of color, and they also love Frida Kahlo's self-portraits and their meanings.

"I like to draw pretty things or things that are interesting to me," Dang-Lee said. "I really like to draw and paint people and sometimes landscapes, but I want to try drawing and painting other things. When I am painting or drawing my own projects, I feel less stress and it just blocks out other things that I don't want to think about."

"In art class we get to use a lot of different mediums," Dang-Lee said. "Personally, I really like the painting unit in 2D design and the colored pencil unit in beginning drawing."

"Khai does not hesitate to help those directly around them," Hinds said. "I see a lot of potential in Khai and hope for continued involvement in the arts here at Niwot. Khai is also part of Art Club, and participated in our Winter Art show in December with a personal project."

Overall, Dang-Lee's experience at NHS has been good. "Most of the teachers and students are nice. In the beginning it was hard making friends because only one person from my middle school went to NHS, but I think being in the art community helped make me make friends," Dang-Lee said.

When they are not creating art, Dang-Lee plays basketball. "I'm not very good yet," they admitted. "And I did color guard during the fall for marching band. I really enjoy it." They also like to act, but they were not chosen to participate in any of the plays or musicals this year. "I'm hoping maybe in the next years," they said. "I did theater camps when I was younger, but I did my first school production in seventh grade."

After graduation from NHS, Dang-Lee would like to take up studies in the field of medicine. "Either a paramedic, doctor or nurse," they said. "I'm only a freshman, so that could change. I want to take an EMT class my senior year."