Whiz Kid: Hannah Lambert

Name: Hannah Lambert

Year: Senior

School: Quaker Valley High School

Key to Awesomeness: Most high school seniors don’t have to choose between attending the high school prom and seeing their artwork debut in a world-renowned museum. Hannah Lambert does. 

Hannah, 17, is enrolled in an Advanced Placement art class in that focuses on 3-D design. The Marilyn Monroe-inspired dress she created out of recycled materials will be featured in the Andy Warhol Museum’s Youth Invasion fashion show. Her dress is one of 12 pieces created by Pittsburgh-area high school students that will be featured as part of the museum’s Youth Invasion.

Youth Invasion features high school students’ take on Andy Warhol’s work. Hannah was particularly influenced by the Marilyn Monroe silkscreen at the Warhol Museum when she first visited last summer.

“I finally understood why everyone had written about her and was so interested in her,” said Hannah, of Sewickley.  “She was really something.” 

Hannah noticed that Warhol captured the innocence and true beauty in Monroe’s face, rather than the scandal and sex appeal that surrounded her. This inspired her to create a piece that also aimed to portray Monroe in this way.

Combining her love for fashion with her newfound interest in Marilyn Monroe, Hannah used articles and photographs of Monroe at her finest and created a dress out of these materials.

Monroe was at her best is when she wore “very little or uncomplicated and classic clothes,“ Hannah said.  This allowed her body, face and true spirit to be front and center in the photograph. 

Hannah said she wants her dress to “capture the innocence of a beautiful young girl named Norma Jean. A girl who had been tossed around, a girl without a real home, a girl looking for something she could not find. She was enamored and then became lost in the Hollywood hype and exploitation.”

“Though my garment does not include those delicious pop colors that Warhol used for Marilyn’s face, it does show the same images of a beautiful woman whose face became a legend,”  Hannah said. 

Quaker Valley spokeswoman Martha Smith said about a dozen works of art are selected from submissions that come from all over the Pittsburgh area.

"It is quite an honor to have her work exhibited in this world-renowned museum alongside the work of Andy Warhol," Smith said.  

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Hannah's Marilyn Monroe-inspired dress will be on display the week of May 9, with a fashion show on May 13.