Dominique Hunter, Courtney Douglas and Stephen McKenzie are among the artists who have won this year’s Guyana Visual Arts Competition and Exhibition (GVACE).
Approximately 230 entries were submitted by artists from all over country for the competition’s six categories. The six categories are: Painting, Drawing, Sculpture, Textiles, Fine Craft and Photography.
Each artist was allowed to enter a total of three entries and the winning pieces were selected by a panel of five judges from each category. The first, second and third place winners were presented with $500,000, $300,000 and $200,000 along with gold, silver and bronze medals, respectively.
On the evening of June 27th, eighteen winners were announced at the competition’s award ceremony, which was held at the National Cultural Centre in memory of departed artists.
Hunter won the Painting category, while Elodie Cage-Smith and Courtney Douglas were awarded the second and third prizes, respectively, while Tammy Walker and Desmond Ali were shortlisted for their pieces. In the Drawing category, the first place prize was awarded to Douglas, while Walter Gobin and Dillion Craig were awarded the second and third place prizes, respectively. Roann Pierre and Addevi Persaud were shortlisted in the category.
McKenzie, Francis Ferreira and Lakeisha Chapman were the winners in the Sculpture category, while Yancy Haywood, Samuel Maughn and Fidal Bassier won the first, second and third place prizes, respectively, in the Photography category. In the Fine Craft category, Kamalita Heralall, Irene Bacchus-Holder and Samantha Corlette were the winners of the first, second and third place prizes, respectively. Dawn Isaacs-Mckenzie was awarded the first and third prizes for the pieces that she submitted in the Ceramics category, while Staffon Williams won the second place prize.
Additionally, Roberto Teekah and Tammy Walker were named the winners of the Promise Award and both walked away with $200,000 and a bronze medal. The 2019 GVACE Education Bursaries, worth $100,000 each, went to Chelsea Ramotar, of the Department of Language and Cultural Studies at the University of Guyana, and Latina Williams, of the E.R Burrowes School of Arts.
Both Ramotar and Williams were nominated by their respective administrators for the bursaries, which are a new feature of the competition that is intended to aid them in their studies and artwork.
The winning entries and other submissions can currently be viewed at the GVACE exhibition at the National Gallery of Art, Castellani House. The exhibition will be open until August 24th, 2019. Admission is free. (Laurel Sutherland)
