Seniors Samantha Cunniff, Madison Tuke and 2024 graduate Rylee Turner are three illustration students who were accepted to the Society of Illustrators of Los Angeles (SILA) West 63rd National Juried Student Competition. These three were selected from 450 artists in 26 countries, with close to 1,200 entries this year.

Cunniff, done in graphite pencil.
Source: John deGraffenreid, Art & Design Associate Professor

Source: John deGraffenreid, Art & Design Associate Professor
SILA is a professional art entity in California whose mission is to promote and encourage interest in illustration. SILA’s Illustration West is an annual competition highlighting the year’s best illustration from all over the world, according to their website.
This year the selection committee was made up of nine judges and one show chair, all of whom are professional illustrators.
Prof. Jack DeGraffenried teaches illustration at SHU and entered the students into the contest in the fall of 2024.
“I, as the illustration instructor, submit student entries each year. Then I wait to see what [the judges] are drawn to,” DeGraffenried said.
DeGraffenried has been entering his students since the ‘90s. Before there were digital submissions to the SILA and the Society of Illustrators of New York, he had to “photograph everything, get them reproduced as slides and label each one individually, which became a real process, so for a few years I stepped away. In 2004, I became aware that we could enter traditionally rendered pieces digitally…it was a lot easier,” he said.
This year’s winners’ artwork will be displayed online on the SILA website in March and will be up for display in the Hawley Lounge hallway at SHU in the future, according to DeGraffenried.
Cunniff, a studio art major, began work on her piece “George Harrison” in the spring of 2024 for a celebrity portrait assignment and finished it within a month using graphite pencil. It features a mustached Harrison staring ahead. Her focus while creating the piece was a range of values in shadow of Harrison’s distinct facial features.
The SILA isn’t the first professional organization to take note of this illustration; “I got accepted into the New York Society of Illustrators in May,” Cunniff said.
Tuke, also a studio art major, worked on her piece for about a year and created her own reference photos using a plastic Petco fish bag and photo editing techniques. Her piece, “Killer Whale Sale,” features a captive killer whale in a pet store bag, as if it were being taken home like a goldfish. It is a commentary on SeaWorld’s ethical violations concerning captive killer whales, noted by the flopped-over dorsal fin that commonly occurs in captive whales.
“I love animals. I’ve always been sick of what SeaWorld does,” said Tuke. “I’ve always thought about how small their tanks are…it must feel like being a goldfish in a plastic bag.”
Both students mentioned the small size of the studio arts program, in which only three are senior studio arts majors, according to Cunniff.
For the small number of students enrolled in this program, SHU artists have seen numerous forms of recognition throughout the years, thanks to DeGraffenried’s ongoing efforts to enter his students in the contests for both the Society of Illustrators of Los Angeles and of New York, respectively. Since 2004, there have been 87 SHU illustration student acceptances into both illustration societies, according to De Graffenried.
“I’m just very proud of their dedication, their effort,” said DeGraffenried. “It speaks highly of what our students have been able to accomplish on a national level.”