The Kilmore Art Expo, now in its 17th year, was the place to be over the weekend.
Paintings and sculptures by a range of talented artists provided visitors to the Show with an experience to remember.
By Wednesday last week, the collections were arranged for Darren Crothers and Anton Fenech to judge and at the much-anticipated preview night the following Friday, the winners were unveiled to audiences whose tickets included complimentary refreshments, snacks, and background music by Valeida.
Mr Crothers officially opened the show, and he said he was excited to see the turnout. He named Emily Street Seymour by Nina Volk as the best painting and said the piece exploited the full nature of water colour and created an incredibly invocative mood and Ms Volk won a generous cash prize of $1,200 donated by the Kilmore Racing Club.
Mr Fenech judged Morning has Broken Crystal Brook Gorge at Mount Buffalo by John Rapley as best photograph and said, it was a wonderful landscape where a nicely exposed sunrise has been captured, and Mr Rapley received a cash prize of $750 donated by the Goulburn Murray Credit Union.
Mr Crothers judged the best sculpture in the show and said Ragazzo Ombrello by Mary-Ann Alyson Long was fun and colourful. Ms Alyson Long received a $750 cash prize from the Expo Committee.
A highlight for gallery goers and volunteers who’ve lived and breathed art across the past six months of event planning was the tiny café serving delicious toasties, baked potatoes, scones, cakes and refreshments.
Look out for more winners in next week’s Review including the winner of the best small treasure gallery, youth section, door prize, and the people’s choice award.
Stand out busking performances
On Saturday buskers came from near and far to perform along the main street in Kilmore where audiences generously chipped in to compensate them for their time, but it was the judges they aimed to impress.
The busking championships is growing in popularity thanks to the coordination from the Rotary Club of Southern Mitchell and sponsorship from businesses and organisations, this year to the value of $7,825 for cash prizes.
This year the founder of the Australian National Busking Championships Allan Spencer, Music Educator Tom Martin, and Professional Jazz singer Georgia Martin had a sphere of local and regional talented artist to choose from with 31 performers entering the competition.
Later, at a free concert held at Trackside selected buskers performed for the final time before the prizes were announced.
In the adult section guitarist and vocalists, the Paul and Maya duo won a generous $1,000 cash prize donated by the Bendigo Community Bank Kilmore and District. The secondary section winner was Edith Marchant, also handy on the guitar. Edith won $600 in cash donated by Mortgage Choice Kilmore. ‘Little’ Lilah Ray in the primary section was incredibly happy with the $300 prize from Australian Cultural Heritage Management.
Rotary President Rose King was delighted.
“Tom and Georgia [Martin] live in Kyneton and have promised to come back next year. They were amazing judges, and I was so glad to have them on board,” she said.
Throughout the day, an unusually hot one for Autumn, enthusiastic audiences were able to purchase tokens to use to vote for their favourite performer. The Rotarians were indeed busy tallying the fluctuating results, but it was Sebastian Georgiou’s compositions on acoustic guitar which stole the show, and he won a $500 cash prize from the Kilmore Racing Club.
This year a special award to spend $500 at Just me Patsy went home with Paul Ray.
“He [Paul] takes the kids to the gigs, he mentors them, and he really deserves the WOW award,” Ms King said.
“If it wasn’t for the mum’s and dad’s getting the kids here, we wouldn’t have them.”
Next week the Review will reveal the judges awards for best band, best duo, best cover artist, the energy award, voice award, poetry and storytelling, emerging artist, encouragement awards, and the non-music award.