elizabeth ayers

December 10, 2025

In this interview, staff member Erin Hasler sits down with Elizabeth Ayers to discuss the variety of places Elizabeth's art has taken her, and how she deals with classic creative dilemmas like perfectionism and rejection.

Erin: To get started, why don’t you tell me a little bit about yourself? Like major, art form, what year you are, that sort of thing.

Elizabeth: I am a BFA, I'm currently a junior. My art form is kind of hard to describe… I generally paint, but I'm in a lot of different studios right now.

E: What got you into art? When did you first start creating, and what medium did you start with?

El: I would say I've always been a creative person. My mom was very good about being like: “Here's boxes of markers, go do stuff with them.” But I didn't start painting until… Oh, I don't even know what year. I was 12. And it was summer, and I was like, “I need something to do.” And so I started painting, and I ended up really loving it.

E: What kind of painting materials did you start with?

El: I was walking through the store and I was wandering the craft aisles, as one does. And they had these little tiny three inch by three inch magnet canvases. And I was like, I didn't even know you could paint that small, and I want to try that. And so then I did for a while. And for the first like year or so of me painting, I painted exclusively teeny, tiny miniature canvases, and that was really fun, and I missed doing that. But I do bigger work now, because they like you to do that for classes.

E: What made you decide to pursue art beyond high school and

extracurriculars?

E: What made you decide to pursue art beyond high school and extracurriculars?

El: I didn't know what I wanted my major to be, first of all, until I was accepted to Calvin. Then all of a sudden I was like, “Oh, I gotta, like, pick what I want to do for the rest of my life,” which is terrifying. There are many things that I like. I like writing a lot, so English is my minor. But I just couldn't picture a future where I wasn't doing art. I don't

Transformation, 57.2

necessarily know that I want to be an artist full time, but I love my major. I love what I'm doing. I don't know what I want to do after college, but it will be artistically related, I know that for sure.

E: What made you decide to submit pieces to Dialogue?

El: I didn’t actually, my first semester, because I didn’t know about it.

[Erin and Elizabeth laugh]

And then, second semester, I wasn't in any art classes yet because they're hard to get into as underclassmen. It was kind of this way to get my foot in the door of the art community at Calvin without being in art classes. It was a good way to get to know some people, get to see what else was happening, and it just sounded interesting. I'd never heard of an opportunity like it at the academic level.

E: I think I have the issues here with your pieces! Can you walk me through these pieces? Which do you really like? What was your process with these?

El: Yeah. I mean, I like them all. Of course I'm going to say that. But it's interesting that I feel like three very different, sort of styles got accepted, which is fun. I really like “A Kitchen”. I'm very partial to it because it's really the only complete work I've done in colored pencil. I tend to just sketch a lot with colored pencils. So I'm proud of that one. That was my high school senior year art project, like the big one. I'm also partial to this one [refers to"Transformation"], because it's my brother, and I think he's really cool.

E: What’s the story with Transformation?

El: My brother’s very into musical theater, and everyone in my family did it in high school, but he's the only one who's actually very good at it. He was the Beast in Beauty and the Beast. So this is that moment at the end of the show when he goes into the smoke and turns back into a prince. And someone got a really cool picture of that moment, and I was like, wow, that looks like it should be a painting. Then there was an assignment for intermediate painting called Find the Light. And the only requirement was that it had to be about light and not the subject of the piece. So that’s what that was for.

E: Going off that theatre angle, your creativity has also manifested as a part of Calvin Theatre Company, right?

El: Yes it has actually.

E: Can you walk me through one of your more recent projects designing the set for Eleemosynary, CTC’s lab series production?

El: Eleemosynary is very interesting because it all happened very fast. I also designed for Cabaret the year before this one. But I was very happy with Eleemosynary. I felt like it had way more of a story to it. I was given a script to read, and as soon as I read the script, I was like, "Okay, I had some ideas.” I got to just kind of run with it. Like, after I knew how they needed it to be used more practically, I got to decorate it however I wanted, which was fun. And I felt like the set for that one really told a story. I enjoyed that a lot.

E: So how have you seen your work evolve over time? Have there been any definitive shifts or changes?

El: For sure. It's easier to notice when I've been painting for such a long time. Obviously, I've gotten, technically better, you know, one would hope after this much time. But also, I think I have much more of a focus on storytelling now. And that’s manifested in my other classes as well. I’m a literature minor, and storytelling is very important to me. I think I try to be intentional in telling a story with my art, and not just painting things that are beautiful, but also inform you about something or celebrate something.

E: Off of that idea of perfectionism and just the general nature of being an artist, have you had any problems with rejection or criticism when it comes to your work?

El: Yes, absolutely. I was actually kind of surprised when you reached out to me this semester because I don't have anything in Dialogue this semester. And I was like, don't they want to talk to somebody who's actually succeeding right now? So that was kind of funny. But then I thought about it, and I was like, oh, you know, maybe I do have something to offer the Calvin community still, even if I'm not actively 100% making masterpiece after masterpiece. I don't think that's a reasonable expectation for yourself, and I definitely put that expectation on myself.

E: Are there any final things you want people to know?

El: I think it’s a really wonderful thing to just try stuff. That's what college is for. Just take an art class. Maybe it won’t be for you, but maybe you’ll find something you love. I would say to keep doing it, keep trying those things. Because you never know.

E: What’s something you’ve learned from art that you carry into the rest of your life?

El: I think I'm very much a perfectionist. And that shows up in my work sometimes, because I tend to work towards very realistic images. So I think you can tell that about me. But I have been learning to let go of that. Being forced in some of my art classes to do things faster or with bigger brush strokes, purposefully locked me out of that really strict attention to detail. It’s actually helped me become a lot looser and more open and pay attention to letting the art itself tell the story versus forcing it into a box.

A Kitchen, 56.2