Morris Arts Announces Scholarship Winners

Published on March 13, 2021

Morris Arts has announced the winners of two scholarships for graduating high school seniors planning to pursue further education in the arts. 

Each year, Morris Arts offers two scholarship opportunities for graduating high school seniors who have exhibited artistic excellence in dance, drama, music, or visual arts and plan to pursue post-secondary studies at an accredited institution or acknowledged arts school or fine arts program. The Elaine Ehlers Arts Scholarship, in the amount of $5,000, and The Eugenie Coladarci Arts Scholarship, in the amount of $1,500, were created to recognize artistic excellence, encourage the artists of the future, and to celebrate the value of the arts to the human experience.

The 2021 Ehlers Arts Scholarship winner, visual artist Peyton McGarry, a graduating senior at Chatham High School. The Coladarci Scholarship winner is soprano Ananya Vasireddy, a graduating senior at The Academy for Mathematics, Science and Engineering at Morris Hills High School

Peyton McGarry will pursue studies in art and architecture at Syracuse University next fall. She sought years of additional training - in fashion design, interior design, and technical drawing / architecture at New York’s Fashion Institute of Technology as well as drawing, painting (landscapes, portraits, still life, contemporary art) in a variety of media at the Visual Arts Center of New Jersey (Summit) as well as ceramics and sculpture at Madison Mud. 

This year’s Coladarci Scholarship winner is soprano, Ananya Vasireddy, a graduating senior at The Academy for Mathematics, Science and Engineering at Morris Hills High School who will be attending Stanford University next fall. She plans to minor in music and/or voice. Ananya trained at Westminster Choir College and at the Lindeblad School of Music and continued private lessons in classical voice and musical theatre vocal training with a Montclair State/University of Oklahoma voice professor. 

Given this year’s unusually strong applicant pool, the panel also awarded three Honorable Mentions, in recognition of the exceptional achievements of these applicants: Composer (violinist/pianist) Kailyn Williams (Morristown Beard School), Actor (dancer/singer) Andrew Palmieri (Chatham High School) and Actor Ava Longarzo (Oak Knoll School of the Holy Child). The judges were unanimous in their choices.

For more information on these talented young artists, visit MorrisArts.org.