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Second time is the charm for local middle school fan

By Kat Halfman
Staff Intern


GREEN BAY – For any Green Bay middle schooler, attending a Green Bay Packers game is exciting in its own right.
Seeing art you created inside Lambeau while at the game is a whole other story.

For Washington Middle School sixth grader Janelle Tubbs – this year’s 6-8 grade winner of the Packers Student Art Contest – come November, she’ll see just that.

The contest
The Packers Student Art Contest was started six years ago, by Mark Murphy’s wife Laurie and the director of marketing at the time, with the intention of bringing Packers-related artwork into Lambeau Field – with an emphasis on young artists and supporting arts in education.

The contest was originally held during the summer, but since Digital Marketing and Fan Insights Coordinator Kristen Shand has been in charge, the time frame was switched to spring to intrigue students while they’re still in school.

The contest has always consisted of three sections and three respective winners – 6-8 grade, 9-12 and students attending a university or technical college.

There are no age limits, only the requirement that participants be enrolled in school, and live somewhere in the U.S.

Besides winning the right to have their artwork displayed alongside the other winners in Lambeau Field for a full season, students who win are also rewarded with tickets to a Packers home game and a $5,000 donation to their school’s art program.

Shand said the point of the art contest is bigger than the Packers, and even Green Bay.

“We want to show that support not just in the Packers community, or the Green Bay community, but to give back to and support those artists wherever they are,” she said.

The contest has a different theme every year, but always ties back into the Green Bay Packers.

This year’s theme was, “Why do the Green Bay Packers inspire you.”

The theme, as well as the 10 finalists, are chosen by an in-house board, who then send the finalists’ work to a school that isn’t participating to have teachers select the three winners.

Some of the previous themes include “Packers Gameday traditions” and “What the Packers mean to you.”

Students’ artistic skills are considered and do play a role, but Shand said, “The description and title also play a big role.”

This year’s winner
Shand said judges were looking for students whose pieces really represented this year’s theme.

She said Tubbs did just that with her piece.

“The title of her piece, ‘When Opportunity Knocks,’ sparked an immediate interest,” Shand said.

Tubbs created a portrait of De’Vondre Campbell and Rasul Douglas standing on Lambeau Field surrounded by a packed house, representing how they had to step up to fill some big shoes, both for their team and for themselves.

The caption on the top and bottom of the painting reads, “Take the opportunity…and run with it!” – much like Tubbs did with the Packers Student Art Contest.

Shand said Tubb’s artwork was chosen as a winner because it clearly illustrated the year’s theme.

Tubbs said Campbell and Douglas have inspired her to take every opportunity that comes her way.

As for the medium, she used acrylic paint, watercolors, markers and a calligraphy pen, expanding her skills into that of a multimedia artist.
Funnily enough, this isn’t Tubbs’ first time entering the contest.

She submitted a piece last year and though she didn’t win, Tubbs didn’t let that dissuade her.

Determined to win tickets to her first ever Packers game, she described her piece as “a drawing of two players who didn’t really start out as big players, but then rose to the occasion.”

Tubbs said she had a plan for her art – two players on the field – but needed to decide who those would be.

Thinking of “which people on the D-train should I do?” Tubbs said Campbell and Douglas immediately stood out.

“De’Vondre Campbell was signed for one year just to fill the position – we didn’t think he would really go far,” she said.
“But then he was the first (middle linebacker) to win the All-Pro since Ray Nitschke for the Packers, and could always uncannily sniff out trick plays. Rasul Douglas was also only signed for one year, and actually filled in for injuries. He wasn’t originally going to play, but he made two pick-sixes in consecutive games, and a lot of other stuff too.”

Surprise win
Tubbs said she was one of the last people in her family to find out that she won – her parents received the notification email when she was already in bed for the night, and she didn’t find out until the next morning.

“I couldn’t believe it,” she said. “I wasn’t even fully awake yet – I was like, ‘This is real?’”

Tubbs said she’s most excited to take her family to the Packers-Cowboys game in November, where Mike McCarthy returns to the stadium for the first time, and to see her art hanging inside Lambeau Field.

“(Seeing her art) will be really awesome,” Emily Moen, Tubb’s art teacher, said. “I told Janelle about it and told her to let me know if she needed any help. She showed me her drawings, but it was really all her. She’s incredible, and I’m just so proud of her.”

Tubbs is a student at Washington Middle School in Green Bay, which will receive $5,000 for their art program.

“We already submitted our budget for next year, and we honestly went through all of our money just replenishing supplies from this year,” Moen said, “I think this money will help with that and give us a little extra, so we could get new tables or pottery wheels.”

As for Tubbs’ future plans for the contest?

“I don’t think I’ll compete the next couple years, while I’m still at Washington, because I don’t know if they’d pick me again…” she said, “But I think I’ll do it again when I start high school, for sure.

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