There are over 200 reg­is­tered stu­dent orga­ni­za­tions at Ferris, but none that is specif­i­cally focused on visual art.

However, Carrie Weis, direc­tor of the Rankin Art Gallery, is try­ing to change that. Weis first saw the need for an art RSO when a stu­dent talked to her about the pos­si­bil­ity of start­ing one. Soon after, stu­dents began approach­ing her about set­ting up art com­pe­ti­tions across campus.

By pro­vid­ing an RSO for stu­dents who are inter­ested in art, she hopes to help these stu­dents accom­plish their goals of pro­vid­ing a cre­ative out­let for stu­dents and help them learn more about art.

One does not nec­es­sar­ily need to be good at art in order to join this orga­ni­za­tion; he or she sim­ply needs an inter­est in art to join. Weis said this orga­ni­za­tion would assist mem­bers in inter­pre­ta­tion, appre­ci­a­tion and greater under­stand­ing of art.

Ideally, a group meet­ing would con­sist of dis­cussing an artis­tic con­cept, going out and view­ing that type of art and then mak­ing art.

“You are only lim­ited by your cre­ativ­ity,” Weis said. “If you have a room full of really cre­ative peo­ple, I just see really won­der­ful things happening.”

The only require­ments for start­ing an RSO is hav­ing a fac­ulty advi­sor and mem­bers, and then reg­is­ter­ing with Ferris to become an offi­cial organization.

Although there are orga­ni­za­tions for craft­ing and dif­fer­ent kinds of per­form­ing arts, this would be the first RSO for visual art.

“I think there are all kinds of rea­sons that art is impor­tant in and of itself, whether it’s a form of expres­sion or a form of self reflec­tion. It’s what makes us human,“ Weis said.

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