By Victoria Stone-Meadows
Students from Lyndhurst Secondary College added their artistic flair to Lynbrook Shopping Centre recently.
The centre held an art competition open to the school.
They received 29 pieces of art from the students which were displayed in the shopping centre foyer.
Members of the public were able to view them and vote for their favourite.
Marketing manager at Lynbrook Village Shopping Centre Melanie Brown said the project allowed the school and the shopping centre to be more involved in the local community.
“The project is all about building links between the school and ourselves and about the centre,” Ms Brown said.
“We are conscious of being a community-minded citizen looking after the community where we trade; these are our people after all.”
Ms Brown said the art project not only allowed people in the community to engage with the students’ artwork, but also gave the students a chance to be proud of their community involvement.
“Most of our locals would have kids who are quite young, so we wanted to engage with the secondary college now and moving down the track,” she said.
“We want to be friends with them and engage these high school students.”
The theme for the art project given to the students was ‘culture, peace, and the environment’ and students were free to interpret that any way they wished.
The top three pieces each received an award from the shopping centre, with a people’s choice award also being honoured at a special lunch for the students at Suburban Burger in Lynbrook.
The winning art piece was painted by student Alex and titled ‘My individuality seeking peace through my internal and external environment.’
For his prize, Alex won a $300 gift card for the shopping centre and his work will be used on the centre’s directories for the next 12 months.
Other winners from the contest are Faith with her painting ‘The culture of a teenage girl’, Ayla’s ‘Hands with henna connected to the world’, ‘Offering peace to the world’ by Dhari and Bonn won an encouragement award for her piece ‘Peace and balance in nature.’
Ms Brown said she hoped to hold the contest each year in conjunction with local secondary schools.
“We are hoping to have this as an ongoing signature event and we would like to see it get bigger and bigger,” she said.
“We have the space in the centre and we put up all kinds of decorations but the preference for us would be to have local schools and art instead; it’s so much more engaging.”
