The mini museum is a tiny diorama filled with miniature artwork, made in an effort to display the artistic talents of Clover Hill students. Its unveiling and opening ceremony will be at the Chesterfield Towne Center on Feb. 3, after student volunteers in the National Art Honors Society (NAHS) finish creating it. 

Every school in the county is designing its own version of the mini museum, and each is putting a unique spin on the idea. NAHS students at Clover Hill, sponsored by art teacher Rachel Principe, are giving it two floors – one that shows tiny artists working at their tiny stations, and another that shows their completed tiny art.

“Our NAHS group that got together decided they want to make it about art, because that’s what they know and love,” Principe said.

The mini museum will showcase several artists creating many kinds of art. 

“The idea is, we are showing the world what the process and the product looks like inside of the art world,” Principe said.

Her hope is that the project will have an impact in the community.

“I think the purpose is to advocate for the arts, and the schools, and what we’re doing, and it’s a way to share the creativity of what’s going on in our school buildings and our arts programs with the community outside the schools,” Principe said.

Principe also hopes to provide student artists with a platform outside of the school.

“I think artists are always looking for ways and places to share their art, because what good is art if it’s in a stack on my table? That’s why I put stuff [on the walls,]” Principe said. “Artists seek out ways for their art to be seen. As a county, and as, like, public school, we do, I think, have to seek it out a bit more. It’s not handed to you. So, coming up with creative ways to do that is always at the forefront, for sure. And, you know, you could think of it as a way of marketing your program, because we’re electives, and we wanna make sure that we still have people making, and creating, and thinking creatively.”

Student volunteers are using their creativity for this project.

“They’ve drawn out a bunch of stuff and we’ve started making the miniature things,” Principe said. “It’s all not to proper scale, so we’ll have to go back and fix them … we have some refining to do. We still have to figure out what materials we wanna use for the sides, for the walls, and all that stuff. It’s a process.”

Supplies for this project came from many different sources, but there was one big one.

“It is a lot of the art department supplied materials,” Principe said. “Some will come from national art honors society funds. Honestly, it’s miniature stuff so a lot of it is like scraps from things, leftover projects, discarded materials that we’re transforming into things.”

Student volunteer Aubrey Trinite has been helping to construct the mini museum.

“So we have a goal every class of what we want to complete, and then we try to get that done and then plan what we wanna do next time, because we have a deadline at like the end of January, so we’re trying to get as much done as possible,” Trinite said.

The idea for the project originated last summer at a meeting between art teachers. 

“There was about eight of us that kinda brainstormed a bunch of professional development that we’d like to do for the year, and some fun stuff, and that was on the list,” Principe said.

Many volunteers found this an enjoyable project to work on.

“Because I like mini things, I think they’re fun,” Trinite said. “They’re fun, I like them.”

Any student who wishes to volunteer can reach out to Principe to help complete the mini museum.