Nation-wide Art Competition Triples In Numbers

A nation-wide art competition has grown from strength to strength in the last three years, tripling its numbers in 2021 to reach an impressive 157 primary schools across the country.

With only one week to go, public votes will determine the winner of this artistic project. The top three students will be flown to Wellington to experience the Illuminating festival and find out who will be crowned the overall winner. The winner will receive a Discover New Zealand prize package taking them from Auckland to Christchurch via KiwiRail’s Great Journeys of New Zealand + $1000 towards their schools art fund.

The competition is part of the iconic Lumino City presented by the Wellington Lantern Festival that brings world-class light installations and performances to the capital city each year. The children's art will be digitally displayed alongside these impressive installations at the festival in October that had over 85,000 attendees at last year's festival.

Festival director, Lily Kao started the competition to encourage her own children to see art and creativity as an important factor of our world.

“It's an opportunity to encourage our tamariki to see art as an important part of our daily lives. Seeing their art become part of a creative and artistic festival, something that people really enjoy can spark the kind of determination we need to create the next generation of artists and creatives that will uplift New Zealand.”

Each child is given a template of a 3D lantern, this year with illustrations of our native endangered animals along with colourful paint pots supplied by major sponsor Resene. The illustrations are merely a guide and important conversation starter with children taking it upon themselves to decide how the lantern will be decorated

The National Children's Lantern competition has reached 15,000 primary school students during the workshops and competition. All resources needed are provided free of cost to schools in the hopes of making art accessible to everyone.

Wellington Lantern Festival’s Lumino City will be taking place on the 15th- 16th of October on the Wellington Waterfront with the competition prize given at the opening of the festival.

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