Student Life
Arts

Visual and performing artists recognized at Excellence in Arts Awards

Ransom Everglades celebrated the outstanding achievements of its creative community at the 2025-26 Excellence in Arts Awards on April 7. The ceremony at the Lewis Family Auditorium recognized graduating seniors and arts faculty members, honored 10 student-artists for their exceptional talent, leadership and dedication to the visual and performing arts, and served as an ode to artistic expression at Ransom Everglades. 
Arts department chairs Cecilia Gonzalez, Quincy Knowles and Matt Stock served as emcees, recognizing the evening's award winners:
  • Outstanding Achievement in Performing Arts - Austin Aagaard '26
  • Outstanding Achievement in Visual Arts - Sophia Biss '26
  • Creative Unity in the Performing Arts - Lucas Noblet '28
  • Creative Unity in the Visual Arts - Alejandra de Lorenzi '27
  • Outstanding Service in the Visual Arts - Noa Garcia '27
  • Outstanding Service in the Performing Arts - Lucas Stone Perez '28
  • Values in Action through Performing Arts - Sukhari Afflick '27
  • Values in Action through Visual Arts - Daniel Depass-Jurberg '28
  • 2025 Emerging Visual Artist - Sebastian Pita Mendez '27
  • 2025 Emerging Performing Artist - Vivi Pasos '28
They noted that additional individual arts awards will be presented at upper school awards ceremonies in April and May. The Excellence in Arts Awards are designed to honor students who live out RE's core values and make a lasting contribution to the RE community.

"Tonight’s awards celebrate our students as a community," Visual Arts Department Chair Matt Stock said. "We strive to give accolades to students not only for the work they produce, but for the support they give to each other and how they represent the school as artists."

The evening opened with an address from keynote speaker and RE parent Aaron Young, a contemporary American multimedia artist who teaches architecture at the University of Miami. Young encouraged student-artists to follow their passions.

"Pay attention to what excites you, what stays with you, and what makes you curious," he said. "... If you keep following what genuinely moves you, that creativity will take you somewhere important."

Gonzalez and Stock also recognized the Ransom Everglades arts faculty and staff for their mentorship. The event included a video retrospective of the year’s artistic highlights and a special acknowledgement of the senior class, featuring portraits by past parent and photographer extraordinaire Carl Kafka.

Gonzalez summed up the evening with this: "The amount of talent in the room is outstanding, and the list of achievements is immense."

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2045 South Bayshore Drive, Coconut Grove, FL 33133
Phone: 305 250 6850

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3575 Main Highway, Coconut Grove, FL 33133
Phone: 305 460 8800

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Founded in 1903, Ransom Everglades School is a coeducational, college preparatory day school for grades 6 - 12 located on two campuses in Coconut Grove, Florida. It is rated the top private school in Miami and among the 10 private schools in North America. Ransom Everglades School produces graduates who "believe that they are in the world not so much for what they can get out of it as for what they can put into it." The school provides rigorous college preparation that promotes the student's sense of identity, community, personal integrity and values for a productive and satisfying life, and prepares the student to lead and to contribute to society.


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