photo courtesy of Alliance for Young Artists & Writers
Many literature greats, such as Truman Capote, Sylvia Plath, and just recently, Memphis’ own Osarugue Otebele, got their starts by being recognized in the Scholastic Art & Writing Awards.
In its 95th consecutive year, the Scholastic Art & Writing Awards, the nation’s longest running and most prestigious awards for young artists grades 7-12, recognizes top creators in 29 categories of expression from sculpture to poetry.
Seventeen-year-old Osarugue Otebele, a recent graduate of Shelby County Schools’ Hollis F. Price Middle College High School, was one of 16 out of 346,000 contestants to be awarded a Gold Medal Portfolio award and a $10,000 scholarship for her collection of works.
Her winning portfolio, entitled “The Journey,” contains eight poems and one personal essay/memoir. Her work within the portfolio mainly encompasses subject matter close to her, such as her experience as a Nigerian-American and her perspective outlook on slavery and civil rights in the U.S.
“Being from Nigeria, I feel like I have two different stories to tell. I can talk about issues in Nigeria that have an effect on me, and I can talk about issues in America that have an effect on me, too,” says Otebele, who moved to Memphis with her mother and two of her five siblings when she was 8 years old to join her father, who had moved to the U.S. when Osarugue was a baby.
“[My parents’] plan for us was us having better opportunities for a good education,” Otebele says. “They knew coming here would set that standard for us. That platform would push us to want to go to [college] and make something of ourselves.”
One of Otebele’s winning works, a memoir entitled “Moisture,” talks about her mother’s persistence in keeping her family in touch with their Nigerian culture, despite being immersed in American culture.
“But we’re here now,” says Otebele. “So we have to be as much into it as possible. We cannot keep ourselves away from it because we’re scared of what might happen. We have to live in this country. We have to work in this country. We have to go to school and make a life out of this country. We have to do it the best way we can and not be scared of what might happen.”
Otebele found out about the awards program through her guidance counselor, and she submitted her portfolio in December to be blindly judged locally. In April, her work, which was judged on originality, technical skill, and emergence of personal vision or voice, was submitted to a panel of judges to be judged nationally.
Shortly thereafter, Otebele received word that she had received top honors in the national competition.
“I was so shocked,” Otebele says. “I literally had no words, which is weird. I’m a writer — I’m supposed to have all of the words in the world.”
In June, Otebele set out for a weeklong awards celebration in New York City. Her work was put on exhibit at Parsons School of Design and Pratt Institute as part of the Art.Write.Now.2018 National Exhibition.
During the weeklong celebration, Otebele participated in a Q&A seminar and attended a prom for the winners.
“I got to meet other people who were also writers and artists,” says Otebele. “It made me feel less nervous because I got to meet people who also write and make art like I do.”
Before the awards ceremony at Carnegie Hall, Otebele and other winners got the chance to meet with special guest speakers Marc Brown (the mastermind behind the children’s book and television series Arthur), R.L. Stine (author of the Goosebumps series), and Ansel Egort (Golden Globe-nominated actor; The Fault in Our Stars, Baby Driver).
“It was pretty exciting meeting the writers we grew up reading and who made our childhoods,” Otebele says. “They gave us advice about continuing on our journeys as writers. It was pretty amazing.”
Otebele’s interests and skills span far beyond creative writing. Before her sophomore year, Otebele took virtual STEM classes at East High School. However, Otebele decided she would rather focus on her interests in creative writing.
“I definitely think engineering helped me become a better writer because now I see a problem and I know how to fix it,” says Otebele. “In engineering there is no box, and that helped with my writing because I don’t see a box to try to keep myself in.”
Additionally, Otebele has served as a youth ambassador for Memphis in May and has interned as a cinematographer for the Levitt Shell’s concert series.
Some of Otebele’s future plans include becoming a screenwriter and teaching English and African-American history to college or high school students.
Trying
By Osarugue Otebele
I was trying to write a poem
About trees
How the darkest of bodies used to dangle off like loose keys
I’m trying to write a poem about trees
Because we only ever talk about the strange fruit hanging
Never of how we turned nature into a sign of death
How this tree so beautiful to black bodies it took their breath away
The light vanished from their eyes
Hands scratching at their necks
Legs shaking, their mind racing
But they were at a beautiful tree
And they could look down one last time and say
Forgive them for they do not know what they are doing
Bring his friends and family to see the end of yet another tree’s innocences
I was trying to write a poem about trees
When I read it, it was a poem about an endangered species
I was trying to write a poem about water
About its beautiful color
Then I heard the screams of men, women and children begging to be thrown overboard
I was trying to write a poem about water
About the stories that it carried, the stolen that it carried
The ships it pushed
The bodies packed so tightly
They could smell the fear of each other's lips
I was going to write a poem about water
But every time I started I couldn't breathe
Salt on my lips
Raindrops falling from my eyes
Teardrops falling from the sky
I was trying to write a poem about rain
But freedom never did
I was going to write a poem about God
About his miracles
How he turned water into wine
Chains into shoelaces
Now we teach our generations how to tie
I was trying to write a poem about Jesus, but
When I read it, it was about a black woman
About how her apples never fell from the tree
I was trying to write a poem about bullets
And how they seem to always have a name, GPS and a color chart to go with
I was trying to write a poem about bullets but as I wrote it
I pictured a boy asking his mother for a quarter
And without question she will hand it to him
He will put it in a machine, with his hands out he will collect the bullets
He’ll learn how to protect and serve his own
The officer will have a dollar in change
The officer will have a dollar in change
I was trying to write a poem about art
How black is art
How we’re not just good for music
How we’re trapping because we’re trapped
And if our music promotes violence what song was Christopher Columbus playing
Because Yung Metro definitely don't trust em
I was trying to write a poem about art
But when the white girls read theirs they called them misunderstood but I was just angry
I stopped trying and I finally wrote a poem about black men
I wanted to say don't you know that you an endangered species, don't you know that tides have carried your history
Pride has hidden your self hate
Don't you know that you are kings
And I wanted to say it's okay to be weak
Even Jesus wept
I wanted to say these things but I was reminded
That black men, black people, black art, don't have time to be weak
© Alliance for Young Artists & Writers/Scholastic Art & Writing Awards. Used with permission.
Otebele is applying her $10,000 scholarship toward her freshman year at Spelman College, a liberal arts school for women, in Atlanta, Georgia. She begins classes this fall.