More than 20 students were honored with monetary awards Monday night at the Annual Juried Art Show.

“A lot of it comes from passion,” senior Alysa Powell said about her inspiration for her prints.

Powell had two prints in the exhibit, one titled “The Haunted Transform,” and another titled “Follow Me,” which won overall third place.

The piece that won was inspired by the passing of her dog last September.

“I really miss her and I was thinking that I just wanted one last good memory,” Powell said.

Powell said she is interested in strange landscapes and dreamscapes. She said she tries to take “strange, supernatural and weird” elements and use them to reflect personal issues.

In the future, Powell said she wouldn’t mind being a professor. She is already a teaching assistant for printmaking professor Max White and said she really enjoys it.

Powell plans to pay off her textbook bill with her award money.

The Best of Show award went to senior Martin Cue for his sculpture titled “Ghost Pepper.”

Cue said he first fell in love with 3-D art when he was attending art school in Milwaukee. At first he went to school to be an illustrator but soon found out he had a knack for 3-D art.

He said what really inspires him is just beauty.

“I know some artists have their crazy ideas of trials and tribulations, but I just want to make pretty things,” Cue said. “In all reality, I’m looking for craftsmanship. I’m looking for shapes and colors and materials and how they fit together and make it work.”

Cue’s winning piece was a marble sculpture of a pepper. He said he has spent more than 400 hours working on the piece over the past two years.

Currently he is working on facial reconstruction, which is a 3-D model of a face.

Crossman Gallery Director Michael Flanagan said there were 230 pieces of art submitted but only half of the pieces were chosen to be in the exhibit.

Flanagan said guest juror Fred Stonehouse made the decision about which pieces were to be in the gallery and which won the prizes.

The Juried Art Show will be on display until this Saturday in the Crossman Gallery in the Center of the Arts.