Youngtalenton showinHighlanes
IF you haven’t had a chance yet to see the finest in local young talent in the Highlanes Gallery on Laurence Street, Drogheda, there is just over a month left to do so.
The town centre gallery has been the venue once again for an exhibition of the 126 winning paintings from this year’s 64th Texaco Children’s Art Competition.
The exhibition will remain open to the public each day from Monday to Saturday from 10.30am to 5pm until Saturday, 3rd November next. Admission is free.
Amongst the 126 exhibits on show are works by five Drogheda students who won top prizes in the competition.
They are James Moonan (12), Hannah Adams (10), Emilija Kiazmovaite (11) and Elsa Brennan (6), all from The Arthouse and Isabelle Parle (12), from Ballymakenny College.
Other top Louth winners, both from Dundalk, are Bella Reynolds (6), a pupil at Scoil Dairbhre and Cara Pilbeam (15), from St. Vincent’s Secondary School.
With an annual entry of up to 50,000 paintings, the Texaco Children’s Art Competition is one that has touched the lives of virtually every family in Ireland at some time or another throughout its 50 year lifetime. In that respect alone, it is quite special.
The world into which the Texaco Children’s Art Competition was born was one distinctly different from today’s. The year was 1955 and the concept devised for the first Texaco Children’s Art Competition (then known under the name Caltex) was one whereby children were invited to illustrate the phrase ‘Keep It Quiet’, a slogan that was being used to promote Havoline motor oil at that time
Though little was expected from it, the competition attracted an amazingly large entry... so large, in fact, that the organisers quickly realised that they had tapped into something very special. Nowhere was this more evident than in the excited faces of those first young winners and their parents who travelled to Dublin to receive their awards presented over lunch in the elegant surroundings of the Gresham’s Aberdeen Room.
In making the decision that a second competition should be held, few would have prophesied that it would become an annual event whose integrity would be universally recognised; one that would endure for half a century during which time it would make its own unique contribution to art and art education in Ireland.
The Highlanes Gallery has hosted local winners since it opened its doors in October 4th 2006.
Recognised as one of the leading galleries of its kind in Ireland, further information in relation to Highlanes Gallery is available at www.highlanes.ie or by contacting Siobhan Murphy or Hilary Kelly at 041-9803311.