I'm a star.

AUC students help bring holiday spirit to D.C.


LANCASTER— Megan Kirkland left her home state of Tennessee to brave the harsh winters of New England so she could study art under Wayne Hazen and his wife Maria Roybal-Hazen at Atlantic Union College (AUC). The couple has not disappointed.

In addition to taking classes for her Business and Management of Art and Graphic Designs major and building her own portfolio, Kirkland has spent the semester working on a massive nativity set that is destined for the nation's political center. It will be used for several live theatrical presentations of the Bethlehem Nativity.

"I've been working on painting it," she said. "I also worked in my concept design class with Natalie (Ford) to come up with designs for the well and carts that are part of the set."

"We've been working on it since the beginning of the semester," said Ford, an art major in her senior year. "It's mostly made out of styrofoam. We had these huge blocks of foam delivered in September. They were like little houses of foam."

Hazen said the nativity is comprised of foam, wood, stabilizing wire anchored to sandbags, paint and other decorations. It is 100 feet long, 45 feet tall at its highest point and 10 feet wide at its widest point. It includes the standard nativity as well as facsimiles of the ancient Temple of Jerusalem and Herod's Palace.

Hazen, who is first and foremost a sculptor, designed the set with AUC art students Eliasib and Elib Apodaca. The set was then heat gunned and spray painted to make it durable enough to withstand the elements. The set will maintain its integrity for several years, allowing for many future performances.

Hazen said the set took about 2,000 hours of work to build and has cost about $14,000.

"The entire production costs about $100,000," he said. "It is all funded by donors."

The performance will be held outside the Seventh-day Adventist Church in Takoma Park, Md., directly adjacent to Washington D.C. It will be directed by AUC's Maestro Francisco de Araujo and will feature 50 actors, many of whom are AUC students.

"Natalie and I play angels," Kirkland said. "This was all the maestro's idea and we're all going down there to help out."

The performance will run Dec. 15 through 24. It is open to the public and is expected to entertain fellow Seventh-day Adventists, people of other faiths and D.C. power brokers.

Kirkland said building the set was an example of the hands on, professional work experience that Hazen and his wife have emphasized since launching a revitalized art department at AUC this year. The couple met and fell in love while attending AUC 30 years ago and this is a way for them to give back to the college.

"I attended Southern Adventist University in Tennessee for two years," Kirkland said. "Wayne and Maria were my professors there. They told me they were coming up here to start a new art program and asked if I'd like to join them. I followed them and I'm getting ready for an exciting winter. In Tennessee, everyone panics when it snows."

Kirkland said New England culture promotes art a great deal more than her home state and she never could have imagined working on a project such as the nativity set back there.

"In the south, art is viewed like, is it necessary? If not, it's just extra," she said. "Art is really important up here."

Kirkland said even the historically important buildings at AUC are testaments to the value that is placed on art and culture.

"It's nice," she said. "In the south, if something is old, we just knock it down. Except Graceland. That is eternal."