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Patrick Laird, an artist from Marshall County placed third in the Martha’s Vineyards Drawing Prize 2020 with Cedell Davis. Courtesy photo -
Laird work End of the Trail was a finalist in the contest. Courtesy photo
Martha’s Vineyard Drawing Prize 2020 winner’s were announced, and Patrick Laird, a Marshall County resident placed third in the contest with his entry Cedell Davis. His work End of the Trail was also a finalist.
The highlights from the contest were:
•The Martha’s Vineyard Drawing Prize, a competition established to encourage the pursuit of excellence in drawing, announced the winners of the seconf year of the competition on October 5, 2020.
•Artists were invited to respond to the theme Fortitude.
•The competition is directed by Martha’s Vineyard artist Elizabeth R. Whelan, and this year’s jurors were art collectors Kathleen and Jim Greer, Posie Haeger from Featherstone Center for the Arts, and Island artist Harry Seymour.
•Drawings were created using graphite, charcoal, Conté, silverpoint, and pen & ink, on paper or board. This year, entries using colored pencil and colored pastel or chalk were also accepted.
•429 entries were received from 37 states across America and 2 Canadian provinces; a 148% increase from last year’s competition.
•25 finalists were chosen, and from these the top prizes were awarded: 1st place $500 to Michelle Smith (Illinois), 2nd place $350 to Diana Belenky (California), and 3rd place $150 to Patrick Laird (Oklahoma). Four Juror’s Prizes were also awarded to artists hailing from Quebec, New York, Iowa, and Maryland.
•All finalists’ artwork is displayed on the www.mvdrawingprize.com website for the next year.
•The theme for the 2021 competition is ‘Questions’, with a deadline of September 27, 2021.
Artist Elizabeth R. Whelan talks about the Martha’s Vineyard Drawing Prize, an online art competition she started last year from her studio in Edgartown.
“I love that meditative mind-hand flow that happens during the drawing process. Drawing, particularly in pencil or charcoal on paper, is one of the most prevalent and accessible art forms around the world. However the art market in North America gravitates to the color and power of paint. I can appreciate this, as I am a painter myself. But painting is expensive: canvases, brushes, oil paints, easels, frames, it goes on and on. It’s a huge barrier to entry for many artists. I wanted to balance that aspect of the art world by creating an opportunity for artists who draw; whose artwork is just as worthy of attention.”
“I also hope that seeing this exceptional work will encourage other artists to try their hand at drawing, or improve the skills they have. The goal of the Martha’s Vineyard Drawing Prize is to encourage the pursuit of excellence in drawing.”
“The Martha’s Vineyard Drawing Prize is an online-only competition open to artists 18 years and older who reside in the US and Canada, and this year’s theme was ‘Fortitude’. I had no idea, when I decided on that theme, just how appropriate it would be for 2020!”
“We received 429 entries in all, coming from Arkansas, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Montana, North Carolina, Nebraska, New Jersey, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, Vermont, Washington, and Wyoming in the US, and Ontario and Quebec in Canada. A real cross-section of North America, represented via drawing.”
“Each year I select a trio of jurors from our local art scene: one collector, one gallery representative, and one artist. Each of these participants in the art world bring a different view point to the judging.”
“The 2020 competition was judged by art collectors Kathleen and Jim Greer, Posie Haeger from Featherstone Center for the Arts, and well-known Island artist Harry Seymour. It was a particularly dificult job this year, as there were far more entries than anticipated and the quality was amazing. 25 finalists were chosen, and from these, 3 prize winners who received cash prizes. They also awarded 4 Juror’s Prizes, which are awards for works that caught the juror’s eye for any reason.”
“However we also wanted to do something to showcase all of the entries. The point of judging an art competition is to select finalists, but there’s always a ton of other artwork that deserves to be seen. So we have our main website and Instagram feed for the Drawing Prize finalists, and this year we have started a companion feed @mvdrawingprize_showcase, where we will post all the entries over the next few months.”
“This second year of the Martha’s Vineyard Drawing Prize was a great success. It goes to show that members of the arts community can create opportunities for each other, so that we can all succeed.”
To learn more about the competition and see the winning entries, please visit www. mvdrawingprize.com and follow us on Facebook and Instagram at : @mvdrawingprize and @mvdrawingprize_showcase