By Chelsea Hackney, Student Reporter

During Summit, about thirty students participated in the Empty Bowls Project, creating ceramic and iron pieces to be sold at an auction for charity.

The project was the first time the Department of Art and Design attempted such an event. Jack Maxwell, chair of the department, said the night was somewhat disorganized and rushed.

“So much work goes into these pieces; people that haven’t done it have a hard time understanding how hard it is,” he said.

Some of the clay pieces were not finished until the morning of the auction itself.

“You could hear the pieces pop at the auction because they were still cooling,” Maxwell said.

He also said the event garnered much more attention than anyone expected, since it was not highly publicized.

Geoffrey Broderick, the professor in charge of the iron pour, said, “Most people didn’t even know about the iron pour, but they saw what was happening and came over to see what was going on.”

After that, word began to spread. Maxwell said he received calls all afternoon on Wednesday, asking about the auction.

With the large number of visitors on campus, the event received a lot of attention. Most of the visitors were either on campus for Summit or members of the Abilene community.

Despite the rush to complete everything, the auction was a great success; people were very interested in the pieces, Maxwell said, “because of the beauty of the work but also because it was for a good cause.”

Every piece was sold, some for as much as $200, and a total $1,563 was raised and donated to the Food Bank of West Central Texas.

The donations will be used to provide supplies for several programs, according to the Web site for the Food Bank. Besides weekly and monthly food distributions, the Food Bank also runs a Kid’s Café, which provides dinner Monday through Friday for underprivileged children who most likely will not receive it at home, as well as the Backpacks for Kids program, providing food for the weekend in ordinary backpacks for at-risk elementary school students.

Maxwell and Broderick both said they hoped to host events like this in the future, possibly even influencing other artists to get involved with charities by bringing them to campus or taking ACU students to events around the country. Broderick said projects like this can create a ripple effect, inspiring students and other artists to look for ways in which they can use their gifts to serve others while still having fun.

“We provide the connection,” Maxwell said. “We can make a tremendous difference in the world.”