Gracie Quinney’s idea of a peaceful town is a place where people show kindness, hope and love to others and her artwork to portray her view has earned her a prize in an international competition.
The theme for the annual Mayors for Peace Children’s Art Competition was Peaceful Towns.
This year the competition received 4,766 applications from children living in the 115 participating towns and cities in 19 countries.
It is the third year Gracie has entered artwork in the competition and each time she has been selected as a finalist, but this year she was placed third with two other young artists in the 11-15-year-old category.
The 11-year-old Wakefield artist spent a month on her artwork which is a self-portrait of herself, sitting in her garden, thinking about everyone being part of one big world.
In her message to the judges, she wrote: “How beautiful would our world look, if we all took care of each other in it? Peace to me is showing kindness, hope and love to others, no matter how different they are to you.”
Gracie used coloured pencils for the brightly-coloured drawing and says it took dedication to complete drafts, colour it in and then outline all the coloured areas.
The end result shows Gracie sitting peacefully in the garden under a rainbow, with flower petals around her representing different flags from different countries.
“I wanted to incorporate the flags and add a person, so I put me in there holding the rainbow and then I wanted all those things that represent peace,” she says.
“Then I wanted to add a lot of colour and brightness to my drawing.”
Her nine-year-old sister Lily was selected for the international competition in the six to 10-year-old category.
Their mother Jessica Quinney says it is a good project for encouraging children to think about what peace means to them.
Their artistic talents are hardly surprising as Jessica was a graphic designer and her mother was an art teacher.
Gracie intends to follow her mother’s career path into graphic design.
Five finalists from each age category are being displayed in the Tasman District Council’s foyer in Richmond.
