So You Want to be ... 2012

The National Gallery of Canada's So You Want to be an Artist 2012 contest is off to a flying start with about 170 entries in a fight to be "liked" into the top 12. At that point things calm down and the experts take over to choose who wins the top three prizes. Many of the entries are really, really good, and several deserve to have more votes than they currently do. Well its only four days in and many many days to go, but here are some images that need some votes. Niki Watts' Thunder Dancer is an awesome piece in graphite. Ben McGuinness' At My Worst reminds us of cool punk photography from a long time ago. Julia Casol's Captured Elegance finds colour and composition in clutter (awesome painting!). And Shannon TJ's Vividsection is super professional illustration. We at CanadaSchool only wish the judges could see all the work. It makes us sad that good work might not make it into the top 12. Maybe next year they will have two streams: A popular vote and critic's picks. And a special note to those with very few votes - it takes guts to enter your work for the world to see and we respect that. Now is the time to take some more chances and work your networks HARD.