Awards Up For Grabs for Talented Design Students

17 June 2013

Awards Up For Grabs for Talented Design Students

The call is out for design students, and 2012 design graduates, from around the country to enter the 2013 ECC New Zealand Student Craft/Design Awards. These prestigious annual awards, run by the Friends of the Dowse and hosted at The Dowse Art Museum, have been supporting the careers of designers and crafters for over 25 years.

Entries are welcome in the fields of furniture, product, jewellery, glasswork, textile, craft, spatial and digital media and close at the end of the day on Sunday 4 August. A formal awards ceremony will take place at The Dowse on 23 August, in conjunction with the international design exhibition, New Olds. The ECC NZ Student Craft/Design Supreme Award is
$3,000 in prize money. The Supreme winner will have their work exhibited at The Dowse and be flown to Wellington for the awards evening. There are two ECC NZ Student Craft/Design Runner Up prizes of $1,000 cash and ten Highly Commended awards: www.dowse.org.nz/scda

Previous winner Genevieve Packer says she was honoured to receive the Supreme Award in 2008 for a surface pattern design Aerial Antics. “I had applied the pattern as an emboss to wallpaper and, through laser-cutting, to acrylic canvas for light shades and blinds,” she says. “It goes without saying that the very generous $3000 was a fantastic bonus… My wallpaper design subsequently went on to be picked up and commercially produced by Pacific Wallcoverings as part of their Pasifika range.” Genevieve’s advice for those considering entering is, “Do it! There are not many local awards (if any) tailored specifically to student-based craft and design, yet allowing for broad interpretation and application within this.” www.genevievepacker.com

Nadine Smith received a runner up award in her second year at Whitireia. “It made me think ‘Hey someone gets my work and what's more connects with it’. Connecting with people through my art is part of what I strive for and it gave me the encouragement to keep making. Because my work was selected it was seen by a wider audience. The award gave me confidence in my ability to keep on developing my work. It made me work harder and not be afraid to enter into selected exhibitions.” www.nadinesmith.co.nz . Jason Maling says, “It validated my efforts and fragile self-belief as well as giving me some money to feed my art habit. I also got to meet some interesting arts related people at a Dowse party.” www.jasonmaling.com. It was 2006, just after he had finished his degree that Andy Kingston received a Merit in the SCDA for Ice Cream Hangi. “It was a nice boost to get a bit of recognition just out of Polytech, it definitely fed some fuel to the flames to help me continue as an artist.” www.avidgallery.co.nz/andy-kingston

2013 sees the awards partnering with ECC, a nationally-recognised lighting and furniture design company. ECC brings exceptional designs from all over the world into our homes and commercial environments. The Friends of The Dowse thank ECC for their generous support.

ENDS

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