Summer Watercolour Competition - 2025
The winners for the 2025 Winsor & Newton Summer Competition have been announced.
McLean Waterfall, Catlins
Min Kim
Judges Comment:
On a hot summer’s day this painting offers a refuge of clean cool water falling over the
many ledges of the scene. The masterpiece creates magic by combining abstracted areas of
wash with representational features, with the whole harmonized by subtle variations in
the colour scheme of blues and greens. The distant simplified background wash, the
mysterious blues and greens of the focal point hidden in the center, and abstracted
foreground wash all challenge our imagination. In addition, through the tension of
skillful dry brush work, we can almost hear the sound of water spilling over the ledges.
Fruity Summer
Jie Yi Liang
Judges Comment:
This painting immediately showers us with an abundance of summer fruit at the market,
rendered in great detail. The potential risk of creating clutter is avoided by skillful
balance of composition and colour. The result is twofold: the eye is drawn to explore
all the interesting parts of the display, but the bold colours and contrast of the focal
point (cherries) draw the painting together. While wandering through the grapes and
blueberries and plastic detail, one starts to realize that these are all cleverly
binding the composition through their lower tonal values and softer colours. The only
problem was being unable to successfully scan the barcode for the cherries!
Reflections of a Summer Night
Sarah Park
Judges Comment:
The contrast between the broad brush dynamic wash and the crisp dry brushwork
demonstrates the potential power of the watercolour technique. This evening setting
benefits from the overall harmony created by the restricted palette of colours. We sense
a quiet tranquil lake with still reflections left and right, however the well-calculated
composition draws the eyes upward into an unspoken but powerful dynamic action of clouds
converging onto the focal point. The critical addition to the painting is the tension
added by the dark horizontal clouds and landforms which add interest and hold the
composition together.
