{"id":5936,"date":"2017-05-01T16:53:22","date_gmt":"2017-05-01T20:53:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/?p=5936"},"modified":"2023-02-15T10:52:34","modified_gmt":"2023-02-15T15:52:34","slug":"georgia-southern-senior-is-designing-her-future","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/2017\/05\/01\/georgia-southern-senior-is-designing-her-future\/","title":{"rendered":"Georgia Southern Senior Is Designing Her Future"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\nNothing thrills Lexus Lewis more than the chance to showcase her artistic abilities.<\/h2>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve always been into the arts \u2014 whether through music, dance, singing or painting,\u201d says the Georgia Southern senior. \u201cAs a child, I always knew that I was creative and no matter what job I have, it always calls for creativity.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lewis is an apparel design and studio art double major and art is everywhere in her life. It is in the paintings she creates in the studio and in the fashions she designs in the classroom. She says anything can inspire her. \u201cI see art in everything \u2014 from the artists I study, to the people I follow on Instagram,\u201d she says. \u201cSome people can look at a blank wall, an empty room or even something as simple as a cup and see it as it is. But I see opportunity. I see art.\u201d<\/p>\n

A Natural Born Artist<\/em><\/strong>
\nBorn and raised in Hephzibah, Georgia, Lewis comes from a talented and musical family. She says Georgia Southern has been the best fit for her, providing her with opportunities to develop her creative talents and professional skills. \u201cThe University environment is very intimate,\u201d she explains. \u201cMy college experience has allowed me to engage with my professors and to get the help that I need.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lewis credits Fashion Merchandising and Apparel Design professors Hope Wallace and Youngjoo Lee for pushing and challenging her. \u201cThey have been so helpful,\u201d she notes. \u201cThey give students a lot of their time even when we don\u2019t deserve it. I really appreciate them for that.\u201d<\/p>\n

The arts student creates her paintings and designs separately without one necessarily influencing the other. \u201cThere are only a few cases,\u201d she says, \u201cwhere I would incorporate my art or any art in my fashion unless I was focusing a series or collection on one or the other. For the most part, my paintings are my inner thoughts and feelings painted on a canvas or whatever the medium may be. But my fashions focus on creating a look.\u201d<\/p>\n

Canvases and Fashions<\/strong><\/em>
\nLewis describes her paintings as \u201ccolorful, humorous, surreal, abstract, fun, and in some cases sexual and political.\u201d She says people who are familiar with her work can usually recognize her style. \u201cI think people identify my work by the techniques I use like the pour method, and the optical illusions that I incorporate in my designs,\u201d she explains. \u201cThe pour method is just what the technique says to do \u2014 pour. I pour a huge amount of paint on my canvas and let gravity do the magic by tilting my canvas in different directions creating a marble design. The viewer also recognizes my work not only by my techniques, but by the elements or subjects I choose to paint. They often recur in my other work.\u201d<\/p>\n

The clothes she designs are a mixture of many eras and cultures, sophisticated and with a hint of sexy and artsy. \u201cMy designs,\u201d she says, \u201care a statement. The statement that I am making is, \u2018this is me.\u2019 I like for everything I create to stand out and to always leave an impression on the viewer. I always put myself in my designs. No matter what I create, I always stay true to myself.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Georgia Southern student debuted her first clothing collection of wearable art in a Carrollton, Georgia, fashion show. She described the collection as \u201cnot cohesive in the way it looks, but in the pieces\u2019 backstory or what I can make from my blank canvas.\u201d Last spring, she was a member of the winning team that won the University\u2019s \u201cDress in the Press\u201d recycling competition. Using only newspaper and tape, students had two hours to create a look based on a Greek god or goddess. Her team chose Hades.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe had previously sketched out a design and designated who was going to be making what when it was time to compete,\u201d Lewis says. \u201cOur design had a cape with horns as the collar, a pleated dress with a gold waist belt, and a gold horned shaft for accessories. We won!\u201d<\/p>\n

Lewis also works in sculpture. As a junior, her representation of a laptop created from wire, won \u201cbest in show\u201d at the annual Form and Content exhibition hosted by the Betty Foy Sanders Department of Art. The arts student admits she could never pick one platform over the other. \u201cThere isn\u2019t a canvas large enough to compensate for what or how I need to express myself,\u201d she says. \u201cThis also goes for fashion. Imagine if there was only one way you could express yourself?\u201d<\/p>\n

The designer and artist has big plans for her future. \u201cI plan to design for Broadway shows, movies and maybe sports teams,\u201d she says. \u201cI also want to do a lot of creative directing from fashion shows, to movies, and other events. My ultimate goal is to own theme parks and museums.\u201d \u2014 Sandra Bennett<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Nothing thrills Lexus Lewis more than the chance to showcase her artistic abilities. \u201cI\u2019ve always been into the arts \u2014 whether through music, dance, singing or painting,\u201d says the Georgia Southern senior. \u201cAs a child, I always knew that I was creative and no matter what job I have, it always calls for creativity.\u201d Lewis […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":6301,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[55],"class_list":["post-5936","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-spring-2017"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5936","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5936"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5936\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6301"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5936"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5936"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5936"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}