During Autumn 2020, EFNA ran a competition on the theme ‘Me and my brain’. The public were invited to create a drawing, painting, collage or digital illustration representing their relationship with their brain, through artwork that explores their hopes, frustrations, or the day to day impact a neurological disorder has on their life.
83 artworks were received from across Europe. The standard, as you will see, was incredibly high. Our judges were extremely impressed by the artistic skill demonstrated and also moved by the meaningful nature of the works and their accompanying stories.
We are pleased today to announce the winners (one overall winner and four runners up).
First place winner:
(€500 prize)
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‘Marshmallow Head’Stacy Hart “Apart from extreme exhaustion that hits like a torpedo, Just one of the many symptoms of the complex debilitating condition known as M.E (Myalgic encephalomyelitis) Is cognitive impairment. It often feels like my brain is a wall of marshmallow and the thoughts that I have and the words I want to speak are somewhere right at the back behind it all and they are all jumbled and to process them more clearly so that I can verbalise them I have to try and get them to the front which requires trying to squeeze them through this thick spongy blob. Sometimes it works… and other times they still come through jumbled.” |
Runners up:
(€125 prizes)
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‘Cityscape III, Canary Wharf’Debbie Ayles “For many years I suffered terrible basilar migraines which totally disrupted my life. As well as headaches and sickness I experienced fragmentation of vision, twinkling, pulsing of colours and shapes, overlaying of images and my vision becoming two dimensional or ‘flattened’. I didn’t understand anything about aura. |
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‘Lost in my head’Danielle Sysmans “Hello, my name is Danielle and I live in Belgium. |
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‘In water I am free’Melanie Hobday “I’ve had cervical dystonia for 24 years and I have been a regular swimmer for most of those years. I find swimming helps me to manage my dystonia by strengthening and balancing my muscles. It is retraining for my brain. In the water I feel free, I move through it slowly and as effortlessly as possible, mindful of the rhythm of my breath and the flow of my movements.” |
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‘Scattered’Ioana Dobriou “Hi, my name is Ioana and I am a MS patient. I have created a medtech/ digital health solution for ms patients MSing with Trauma (https://msingwithtrauma.wixsite.com/home) , that converts MRI images of invisible disease into therapeutic music compositions. Designed for MS patients to have neurological and psychological effects. This project was born out of my love of technology, art and music. |
Congratulations to each of these fantastic winners!
And thank you to all those who entered. This was a close contest and we appreciate all of your work. A gallery of all the competition entries can be found here: https://www.efna.net/brainlifegoals/art-gallery/
Thank you also to our judging panel – Richard Roche, Alexandra Heumber Perry, Joanna Kniaz-Hawrot and Elizabeth Cunningham.
Alongside this art competition, EFNA ran a colouring competition for children. Congratulations to our winner, Szofia Dianis (age 6) from Hungary. Her entry is shown below. Congratulations also to the runners-up: Oliver Hokkanen (age 7, Finland), Rose Tobin Nnabuife (age 6, Ireland), Philip McCoy (age 7, Ireland) and Mustafa Bhatty (age 6, United Kingdom). Your prizes are on their way!
All entries to the colouring competition can be seen here.
