Commentary by ScarlettHenery

As Marian students, we are constantly encouraged to showcase our talents and skills to the best of our abilities. Marian provides us outlets to let our creativity and insightful thoughts be seen and heard. One of these outlets is the bi-annual Burn magazine. Burn is a way for students’ own poetry, artwork and photography to be published and shown to the whole school. It offers students the opportunity to see their works in an official artistic magazine. 

Getting work published in Burn is an accomplishment that needs to be given more credit. It’s a selective process choosing the pieces that will eventually make it into the magazine. The final pieces are not only the best our school has to offer but can  also be some of the most thought provoking, beautiful art pieces I’ve seen. I believe that the artistic capabilities of this school outweigh those of other high schools. Here are some of the pieces from fall of 2023 I believe deserve another round of applause from the Marian community.

The ink drawing titled “Cerritulus” in the fall 2023 edition features a detailed drawing of a mythical creature. It was drawn by sophomore Sofia Bostrom and sticks out to me in this Burn edition as its detailed lines and realistic appearance make it extremely interesting to look at. Bostrom says that she drew this when she was “12 or 13 years old, and at the time I was really into dragons and animals.” She used different and “weird” designs for the dragon which inspired the name for the dragon. Sofia named the dragon after the Latin word for weird.  

The next artwork that grabbed my attention was the digital media piece titled “Colorful Wonder” created by freshman Lilly Italia. This piece is a portrait of a man with a confused and bewildered look about him. It uses differing colors, textures and line patterns. The contrasting colors and unique take on portrait drawing makes this piece one to remember. 

Italia has always had a fascination with art and loves to create pieces of musicians she enjoys. This piece features the lead singer of the band Radiohead, Thom Yorke. She likes to incorporate the style of the musician into her art. The abstract and interesting music he creates allowed her to work more creatively and freely with this piece.   

One poem that stuck with me in the latest Burn edition was “not really the end” by sophomore Zoey Rumbaugh. This poem touched my emotions and made me really think about the people I love in my life. It’s about having to say goodbye to someone in your life, but then them reassuring you that they’ll always be there. Rumbaugh says this poem was inspired by a loss and her way of getting through it was to remember that he was always with her. She said that writing what she thinks he would say to her made it feel like he really was speaking to her.

These were just some of the amazing pieces featured in Burn this year. With all of the talent in our school, this semester’s edition is bound to bring interesting and creative new works as well. Remember to listen for Burn deadlines and submit any artistic or creative works you feel confidently about. Let the Marian community see just how talented our students are.

For the spring edition of Burn, there have been 153 submissions. 107 of these were art pieces and 46 were written submissions. In the fall edition, which was distributed on Dec. 11, there was 156 submissions. 

The Burn staff decides on which pieces are published by voting based on space. Then, the editors match artwork and poems to go on pages, and those works go to the staff to design a page, where they work to enhance the already existing beauty.