Paige Budd of the Anglican High School (AHS) Saint George’s was among the top performers in the 2020 Creative Youth Art Competition sponsored and hosted by the ECCB and the Regional Security System Asset Recovery Unit (RSS ARU).
She placed third in the age 13 to 16 category with her piece centred on cultural awareness with the theme ‘Keeping culture alive.’ Her painting illustrates the use of storytelling as a mother walking down a path with her daughter and telling her about many precious events and traditions in the Grenadian culture that need to be kept alive with the hopes that she will do the same.
Paige, granddaughter of the late Jo Budd of the disabled community, will receive $1,500 while AHS will be awarded a grant of $1,000. The top performing students came from five Eastern Caribbean Central Bank (ECCB) member countries.
The first prize went to another island as Sage Connor of the Omololu International School in Anguilla and Anique Ward of the Clarence Fitzroy Bryant College in Saint Christopher (Saint Kitts) and Nevis captured first place in the 13 to 16 age category and the 17 to 19 age category respectively.
Sage’s piece titled, A Colour of Hope, is her interpretation of the topic, Recycling: Waste Management for an Eco-Friendly Region. The piece is a painting done in mixed media, including recycled paper, where the silhouetted face of a woman symbolises humanity.
For her interpretation of Cultural Awareness: Keeping Our Culture Alive, Anique depicts eight characters assembling to celebrate and embrace their different cultures in the form of a dance. The characters represent each of the ECCB member countries.
The judges of the competition, who are professional artists from across the ECCB member countries, have described the pieces as awe-inspiring and said they took the opportunity to learn from the students’ work. “We were blown away by the skills demonstrated by the students in their art pieces”, said Taffari Crawford from Anguilla, the Head Judge for the 13-16 category.
Shadrach Burton from the Commonwealth of Dominica and Head Judge for the 17-19 category described the art pieces as really amazing and showed a lot of talent.
The first place winners in each of the categories will be awarded a $3,000 cash prize and a grant of $2,000 will be awarded to their respective schools. The students who placed second will each receive $2,500 and their schools will be presented with a grant of $1,500.
Fifty-six entries were received from the eight ECCB member countries on the three topics: Recycling: Waste Management for an Eco-Friendly Region; Cultural Awareness: Keeping Our Culture Alive; and Combating Crime through Financial Investigations and Asset Recovery.
The eight judges were: Taffari Crawford, Anguilla; Renee Phillip-Morris, Antigua and Barbuda; Shadrach Burton, Commonwealth of Dominica; Roland Benjamin, Grenada; Stephen Mendes, Montserrat; Deborah Vaughn Tyrell, Saint Christopher (St Kitts) and Nevis; Alwyn St Omer, Saint Lucia; and Julian Pollard, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines.
