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Organised by our amazing Library team, this year's competition theme was "growth".

We are delighted to announce the winners of the Lucy Cavendish College 2024 Art Photography Competition, and we are incredibly impressed by the creativity and talent shown by our students.

The competition was open to all students, and we received a wide variety of entries in all kinds of art forms, including photographs, digital art, watercolours and one small painting. The judges were very impressed by the high quality of the work submitted.

The winners and runners up are:

First prize – Fungi by Francesca Haynes (Grad Medic)

Painting of fungi - light blue and grey

The judges liked the hand-crafted quality of this entry, as well as its colour and composition. It also had texture, which immediately elevated it in the scoring. There was a sense of animation to it and while many other entries used flowers to represent growth, this one showed originality by using fungus.

Second prize – Lucy Stag by Daniel Myers (MPhil Medical Sciences: Stem Cell Biology)

Painting of Lucy Stag

This entry combined tradition and originality by bringing the stag, shell and water lily from the Lucy coat of arms into the digital age. The rearrangement of these three elements drew attention to the upward thrust of the plant and its connection with the brain/mind of the animal. The design was very well executed: the judges were impressed by its three dimensional quality. It also showed depth of thought, the blue background reintroducing the element of water from the coat of arms and showing the word ‘growth’ translated into many languages, representing the multi-cultural Lucy community.

Third prize – Bubbles by Olly David (UG Architecture)

Mom and child blowing bubbles

This was a highly original work, the most colourful entry and it made the judges smile. The entrant certainly rose to the technological challenge of photographing soap bubbles in an outdoor setting and combining several photographs. The work nicely captures a moment in time, when an adult enthrals a child – and no doubt their own inner child – with a simple game. That moment is often photographed, but this work made it special.

Entries are displayed in the Library for the beginning of Easter term. Winners and runners-up will be shown in College from June 2024.

View all entries below