There is a first-year student that hundreds of Quinnipiac University students have already met – they just don’t realize it. Political science major Sasha Caracciolo is not known by name or grade, but by her index card caricatures of an iconic white beagle.
“We’ve been really trying to hunt down the Snoopy culprit,” sophomore biology major Olivia St. Clair said. “It’s just … how can you not like Snoopy?”
Actually, that was Caracciolo’s exact motive.
After moving in on Aug. 22, she did what every other first-year has done — find their classes.
“Every time I walked into a classroom, I’d see a whiteboard or a chalkboard,” Caracciolo said. “I thought ‘what’s something easy, fun and simple (to draw)?’”
Thus, a third-floor Tator Hall chalkboard became the first canvas for an ongoing student art project. Then, Center for Communications and Engineering 207 was hit, along with the lecture-hall-sized whiteboard in the Mt. Carmel Auditorium. So, Caracciolo began sending pictures to her orientation leader, Louis Brodsky. Jokingly, he bet her that he could erase all the Snoopy drawings, but Caracciolo wasn’t losing this battle.
“I’m gonna make too many for you to erase,” Caracciolo told him. “And that’s where the paper Snoopys came in.”
According to Caracciolo, she’s already made dozens of drawings this semester. Each drawing only takes 3-5 minutes, but the impressions last exponentially longer. The different Snoopy archetypes have ranged from Batman Snoopy, to Detective Snoopy, to Fishing Snoopy and Pirate Snoopy.
“I didn’t know they were gonna gain that much traction, but they did,” Caracciolo said. “It’s a never-ending Snoopy.”
Her Instagram account, @snoopy_at_qu, spawned from the infamous Class of 2027 Snapchat as Caracciolo would add a post each time she completed a drawing. The account amassed 100 followers in about 10 days and sophomore finance major Suzeline Cadestin has been following every step of the way.
“I first saw it on the Class of 2027 page … which is funny because I’m not even in the Class of 2027,” Cadestin said. “It’s so chaotic on there but those drawing are just so cute and it just brings a little bit of joy to everyone.”
Caracciolo even enjoys making the Snoopys part of the scene. She’s made a Public Safety Snoopy for the Public Safety office window and a Gym Snoopy for the lateral pull-down bar in the Recreation and Wellness center. Even a Barista Snoopy made an appearance at Starbucks.
Along with her two siblings, Caracciolo spent the first six years of her life overseas in Armenia and Georgia. Her father held many high positions, including a Georgian diplomat, and her mother was also a diplomat but ceased working when the triplets were born.
As a result, art was at the forefront of Caracciolo’s childhood. Being home with the kids allowed her mom to foster their creativity.
“I started drawing when I was a month old,” Caracciolo said. “My mom would give us fingerpaint and let us paint all over the walls. Then, she’d clean it off and we’d do it all over again.”
Caracciolo said her mom owned a white Jeep and let them take acrylic paint and cover the car. One sibling would always paint flames, while Caracciolo would make unicorns. One time, a police officer pulled her mother over suspecting an act of vandalism.
After seeing the 2015 animated film “The Peanuts Movie,” Caracciolo remembers her first fascination with the Charles Schulz characters. She became attached to one dog in particular.
“(Snoopy) has so much emotion in him,” she said. “He’s so expressive though he never actually spoke.”
She also enjoys his other sides, and that doesn’t just mean “Joe Cool” or the World War I flying ace.
“He’s very eccentric. I love eccentric characters,” she said. “He’s also very mischievous … I can relate to that, I like to have fun too, you know?”
By high school, Caracciolo said art began to feel like a chore, so she focused on other academic interests more and left her artistic side in a more personal place.
“I have a lot of different interests and a lot of different passions and I want to fuel all of them,” Caracciolo said. “I think you should always do something that fulfills your soul.”
That’s the philosophy that drives Caracciolo to become the best version of herself in college. She knows her passion can take her places without it being her major.
“I knew I wanted to get involved somehow, I knew I wanted to make a name for myself here,” Caracciolo said. “I was aware that if people liked it, it could turn into something big and I was willing to take that risk.”
