Elly Keyes hadn t thought very highly of a pen-and-ink drawing she’d made of the Kansas Statehouse during her sophomore year at Shawnee Heights High School, but then her teacher Avery Ayers-Berry encouraged her to enter it in as many competitions as she could.
About a year and a half after she first drew it, Keyes’ painting is now hanging in the U.S. Capitol.
“I didn’t like it at first,” said Keyes, who is now a junior. “It looked rough, since it was a pencil drawing at first. But the more I added, the better it started looking as I added more ink. It was fun to do all of the little details on the (Kansas) Capitol and the surrounding places.