Ella Maines, a sophomore at IHS, is an incredibly gifted artist. During the summer, she attended an animation program at Alfred State, and I was able to contact her in July and ask her about her experience with art.
Katie Lin ‘22: To start us off, how has art influenced your life so far?
Ella Maines ‘22: I feel like it’s expanded what I can create, like lots of people can’t really turn their ideas into art because they feel their art isn’t good enough, or they don’t really like art. I feel like I’m gifted with this talent because I can really put all of my ideas onto paper.
KL: What programs do you use when you animate?
EM: I use this program that has kind of a silly name, “FlipaClip.”
KL: With experience, do you feel you have developed your own personal style of art?
EM: I feel I have, but I’m trying to go for more of a Disney, John Belushi style. It’s a really interesting style because there’s a lot of character to it and a lot of movement, and I just really like it.
KL: Is art an effective way for an artist to voice their opinions and advocate for a cause they care about?
EM: I feel like it really is because you can portray a lot in art that you can’t really do in film or photography.
KL: On April 20, you posted an animation on your YouTube channel, “Freckella,” about the Columbine shooting, and it was very moving. Why did you decide to make an animation on Columbine?
EM: I started researching Columbine in September 2018 because I learned that there were a lot of people out there who were using it to exploit their own political beliefs, had crushes on the shooters, and romanticized the shooting, which is really not that great. A lot of notoriety was going to the shooters, and it’s important to focus on the fact that shootings are usually caused by mental health issues than guns. Additionally, not a lot of people really pay attention to the people that were actually killed.
KL: The information in your animation is incredibly well-detailed. How did you research all of the victims and what happened?
EM: I used sites that went in-depth into the lives of victims and their families, and I found lots of home video footage and photographs of the victims that I used for reference. There’s this one scene with a kid named Daniel Mauser, who was one of the people who died, and he’s walking into the frame holding a piece of paper, which was actually from a home video that his dad recorded of him when he was reciting a speech for class.
KL: Clearly, you spent a lot of time making your animation as accurate as possible. How much of the film is your own imagination?
EM: I’d say about 60 percent. A lot of the stuff I thought of in my head. I’m very proud of that shot where one of the shooters is walking out of the door and you can see his shadow. It portrays what his mom thought of him before the massacre and what he was hiding.
KL: I definitely thought the way you used the shadows and the black and white was very emotional and clever. While watching the animation I was very moved that only certain parts of the film weren’t black and white, like the red blood and the bright orange candlelight. How did you decide what was black and white, and what wasn’t?
EM: I wanted to put emphasis on certain parts I thought would really have an impact, like the candlelight, the blood, Danny Rohrbough’s purple face, and one of the victim’s brother’s blue tears while everything else was just in black and white.
KL: What effect do you hope your animation will have on the public?
EM: I’m hoping that more people will stop focusing on statistics and start learning more from actual survivors. One of the things I regret about the animation was at the end when I said “gun violence will continue to plague our world. We have to change that . . . ” because it makes the whole thing sound like a gun control PSA, which I never intended.
KL: Personally, I believe you found the right balance between providing information about what happened and calling out for change without seeming like a PSA. In your opinion, what do you believe should be done to end gun violence?
EM: In my opinion, for gun violence and any kind of violence to end, people should stop focusing on the weapons and the message of it, and focus more on the people who need to be helped. Many complaints were filed to the police prior to the massacre, and the police didn’t do anything about it. They didn’t really look for warning signs, as it was 1999 and school shootings weren’t really a thing yet. As Randy Brown says, “The things that would now be considered red flags . . . at the time we just excused as ‘teenage behavior.’” We need to really focus on what could cause someone to go down this path and bringing them out of that dark hole.
KL: Are you talking about a larger emphasis on mental health?
EM: Yes, and we are twenty years too late from stopping Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold from doing what they did, but we can stop other people out there.
KL: For any novice artists, do you have any words of wisdom you’d like to say to them?
EM: I’d say don’t be afraid to go as wild as you can. Don’t be afraid to make whatever you want. Don’t let anyone tell you that anime is for losers or that Disney shouldn’t be copied. Don’t follow any of that, and do what you want, as long as it’s not hurting anyone.
KL: Do you have any projects planned for the future?
EM: I’m working on a comic right now, called “An Untold World,” that I’ve been working on since eighth grade. I recently finished page 91 of it.