OLIVIA RASH
rashol@lopers.unk.edu

Sophia Gilsdorf is in the midst of her sophomore year as a Visual Communication Design major. Gilsdorf’s hometown is Falls City, Nebraska graduating with 353 people.

Why did you choose UNK for your education?

“I chose UNK because I really, really liked the small class sizes. I’m a pretty shy person and I thought if I went to a bigger school I’d get kind of lost and fade away. I wouldn’t be comfortable asking questions, and I wouldn’t be able to get to know my professors.”

What would be a dream job post graduation?

“I haven’t really research it too much, but I’ve been getting more and more interested in the idea of graphic design and advertising. I recently went to a conference in Omaha called Meet the Pros.”

Meet the Pros is a conference for students to listen to professionals talk about their careers in fields like graphic design and advertising, Gilsdorf was also about to tour at Oxide design based in Omaha. Other companies like Hudle and designers out sourced by companies like Runza were present this year. 

 “I’m so excited to get out and hone my skills more so I can apply for intern ships and get my foot in the door. There are so many directions I can with my degree, start my own design firm, though that doesn’t interest me, I really like working with other people, hearing people’s stories and learning about different people’s perceptive on things, and I like the idea of working for a big business.”

What is your greatest struggle in life right now?

“Time management, that’s a big struggle for me right now.” She said as she laughed at herself, “with working a lot, and having classes are about 2 hours long, which is fine, but art is very time consuming. You can’t whip out a drawing in a short amount of time. Everything takes you through a process.” 

Gilsdorf is a supervisor at her full time job, working about 40 hours a week on top of being a full time student. Often times she doesn’t get off work until late in the evening, and struggles with the idea of coming to the art studio to work on an assignment after a long day at work. “Finding time to come in and work you often have an internal debate asking if you really want to come into the FAB [Fine Arts building] to work for 2 hours, also balancing a social life, I think every college student struggles with that you know? 

Finding time to find things that are fun and get you excited again and make you want to get out of bed in the morning. As well as confidence, confidence in my artwork, it’s a big thing, and comparing myself to others because everyone in this department is at different skill levels and everyone has a unique style and everything. It’s something that is very hard, you should always learn from your peers, but you shouldn’t want to be exactly like them and try to stand out in some way. It’s a challenge.”

What is something you can’t stop thinking about?

“I’m always planning, I’m a big planner, even if I don’t always stick to it I’m always thinking in my head, I’m going to get out at this time and go do this. I also can’t stop thinking about softball, it’s kind of random and weird but I just get the urge to throw a softball again.”

What is something about majoring in art that people don’t understand or don’t get the opportunity to be apart of?

“I think that they think, oh you paint a pretty picture, but there’s a lot of planning included like, history, background, research, that you have to know. I know some people think, oh you just put what looks good, well not necessarily, you have to know about your target audience and know what they’re going to respond to, and if this been done before? 

A lot of times they just automatically think, “oh you’re an art major, oh you draw, oh you paint”, well no, there’s a lot of amazing stuff that can be done. And I know some people think, well why do you need to go to school for that? I can watch YouTube videos about it online, but there’s a lot of history in art and the importance of that is to be able to make something really special.”

What would you tell someone who isn’t in the art department about being an art major? 

“Art is super fun. When I get into a project you lose all track of time. Time isn’t a concept anymore. I’ve been in the drawing studio for 2.5 hours and it felt like 10 minutes, you get so in the zone and become one with the piece whether it’s a drawing or a design layout.”

“You’d be surprised what you can do with an art major of any kind. It’s just as rigorous as any other college courses.”