At just 14 years old, Alexandria Kaufman, a student at Two Rivers Community School, is already able to say something that most adults cannot — she’s had her artwork displayed in a museum. Twice.

“Everyone has been saying to me, ‘You’re really that talented of an artist?’ and are shocked at my ability,” Kaufman told the Post Independent on Wednesday during a joint interview with student Regan Randall, Maker Space Educator Terry Muldoon and Powers Art Center Director Sonya Taylor Moore. “(Displaying my work at Powers Art Center) will have a lasting impact because being able to say this young, being able to say at 14, ‘I’ve been in a museum twice,’ most people don’t get to say that.”

Kaufman’s work was first exhibited in the Aspen Art Museum’s 2023 Youth Art Expo, “Puppets, Masks and Storytelling.” The biennial expo showcases over 1,0000 artworks created by students from the extended Roaring Fork Valley, all in a themed exhibition. 

Now, Kaufman’s pop art, along with the creations of 26 of her fellow middle school students, is on display at the Powers Art Center’s “Future Creatives: A Student Art Show.” 

In December, participating students from Two Rivers Community School embarked on a mission. Their goal was to explore the museum’s pop art collection, find a piece that resonated with them and use that inspiration to create their own original artwork. 

Inspired by the style of artists Robert Rauschenberg and Jasper Johns, Kaufman’s piece, “Midnight Blue Killjoy”‘ is an exploration of the album “Danger Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys,” by the American rock band My Chemical Romance. 

“That album was really colorful and bright compared to their other works that are more depressing and dark,” Kaufman said. She created a collage using fragments of album art, poetry and other images that represent the band over a black and blue acrylic painting. She then added designs with white paint markers.

Randall, a seventh grader at Two Rivers Community School, also drew inspiration from Rauschenberg’s work.

Her pop art piece, titled “The Explosion,” depicts the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear power plant disaster in Ukraine. “When I first looked at Rauschenberg’s pieces (‘Water Stop’ and ‘Guardian’) that’s what popped into my head, an explosion, something dramatic,” Randall said. “I just thought it would represent all of the crazy stuff that happened there.”

Having her work exhibited in a museum ” feels crazy,” Randall said. “I’ve been really proud. It feels unbelievable to me, and it feels great.”

Students like Randall and Kaufman are the reason why Moore, the director of the Powers Art Center, makes it a priority to showcase the work of young artists in the museum each year. 

“When in your life do you get to show your work in a museum? I hope that it resonates forever,” Moore said. “I think these two are an example that it will. It really made an impact on their life and set the bar pretty high.”

Like many long-term students at Two Rivers, a K-8 school, Kaufman and Randall have been taking art classes with Maker Space Educator Muldoon since “the beginning of time,” as Randall put it. 

Muldoon has been affiliated with Two Rivers for over a decade. Initially, she ran Fine Art Friday before assuming the role of in-house art teacher eight years ago.

Her mission is to instill confidence in her students while nurturing their artistic talents.

“I really value art early on in life to help with creativity, self-esteem, confidence,” Muldoon said. “When I tell my kids ‘We’re going to use sharpie today,’ straight sharpie and paper, it’s about confidence building. It’s not about the final product.”

Muldoon’s teaching philosophy stems from her personal experience as an artist. 

Art is Muldoon’s second career — she attended art school when she was 35 after years of criticism from naysayers in her life. 

Her story adds fuel to her student’s artistic fire. 

“Her story has inspired us all to do art and become better artists ourselves, and I see it with other kids in the school, too,” Kaufman said. “She is such a great artist. She went to art school — she could be doing so much more than this, and she’s staying here and helping us and watching us grow and blossom and do all that for us, it’s such a cool thing to see for us.”

Muldoon’s relationship with her students convinced Moore that Two Rivers was the right choice for this year’s art show. 

The previous year, Muldoon and her students had visited the center for a field trip. 

“The way she had this presence and her students looked up to her and the way she…managed her students was unlike others I had seen,” Moore said. “And it comes from her passion.

“She was so passionate about art and sharing that passion with her students and they all respect that because she has that inside. It’s just who she is,” she added. “And I knew immediately this was the school that I wanted to feature.”

View “Future Creatives: A Student Art Show,” from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday-Friday and 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday through March 28 at the Powers Art Center, 13110 Colorado Highway 82, Carbondale.