Visual arts teacher Daphne Confar stepped in this year for Visual Arts Department Chair Jennifer Hughes while Hughes enjoys her sabbatical. Confar has been an artist for decades, with her work displayed in galleries all over the country. Additionally, her two sons went to Milton. Through her time as an art teacher at Milton, Confar strives to bring angles of “perfect imperfection” and playfulness to Milton’s visual arts programs, enriching art students’ experiences and spreading the joy of art to everyone in the Milton community.
Confar explained her journey to her being an art teacher. After obtaining a BFA in drawing and painting, she “worked at a really good gallery in LA and just sussed out how to be a painter.” She added, “the economy was well and I had galleries [all over the country],” remembering how each sold out show made her think, “oh my god, it's easy!” But, the economic recession of 2008 took a hit on her sales and galleries. Fortunately, Confar stayed consistent with her art journey and passion for the craft.
As a teacher of Printmaking, Advanced Drawing, and Class IV Visual Art, Confar’s mastery in art spans a wide variety. She explained, “[I am] a painter, but I love playing around and just getting into all different kinds of mediums…I like to kind of find a feeling; I like to capture a moment. I think it’s something innate to human nature and it probably manifests in all kinds of different ways.” By “capturing a feeling,” she hopes to create art that makes both her and the viewer feel “a certain way.” She wants to tell her Class IV students, in particular, to have fun with the projects: “Class IV arts is so low stakes… and I just want them to have fun and enjoy the process. You’re not going to love every single thing we do but you might like one of the things we do and want to explore that more in the future.” And, to all her art students or those who are considering pursuing it, she encourages them to “have fun, make mistakes, push the medium, and see what you can do with it.”
Confar’s free style transfers easily to her students. Mary Quatrale ’26, a student of Confar's Advanced Drawing class, feels that Confar’s teaching style is “very ‘go with what your heart [is],’ art is how you look at it.” She added that Confar is helpful but not imposing in her feedback: “[she tells] us this might be better here or there, but she lets us do her own thing and allows us to look back at our drawings and be like, ‘what can we change about it?’ [Confar’s teaching style is] very talk-through as we go, but she still allows us to do a lot of it, which is really nice.”
Confar believes that art “is in a person, and [she has] always just loved looking at things and making things.” She added, “there is something special in that creation process that I just love. It kind of took me a little bit of time to find out that I could be an artist. I had to grow up a bit first. [Then], when I first started, my work was about painting people…I love to capture a person and try to describe something about that person…that goes deeper than what they look like. I wanted to evoke an empathy in the viewer.” She hopes to capture the imperfection of humans and represent that concept in her art.
Raphy Rufino ’27 worked an internship with Confar over the summer, after being “blown away by her art [during her Nesto Gallery installation last year].” Rufino reflected, “she brought my art to a level I would have never imagined before. She gave me tips…and taught me different ways to just make art, experience art…she just completely changed my artwork, and [the painting reviewed with Confar] is one of the favorites I’ve ever made.”
At Milton, Confar continues to make a deep impact on the community. Many remark on her kindness and sweetness. Quatrale remarked, “she’s been a very well developed artist her whole life, and just starting this new journey for her teaching, it’s super cool to be part of that journey with her. I see her as a friend more than a teacher and that’s really helpful for a class environment…and I feel like that goes for everyone in our class.”
As a painter who looks for the potential of playfulness, humor, and personality in her work, Confar sometimes defines art as “those little moments that make a life feel like you recognize it. It feels homey.”