Blue Girl in the Sun wins $20k Wollongong Art Gallery watercolour prize FLOW

Hughes' work Blue Girl in the Sun was announced the winner of the national contemporary watercolour prize on Friday night.

Read more: Learn more about the Voice to Parliament from an Indigenous lawyer

The winning work will be added to the gallery's permanent collection and, after the current exhibition, will be available for future displays.

"It's such a lovely thing to receive a prize for something I spend most of my life doing," the artist said.

There were 82 finalists selected for the exhibition, which is currently on show until March 2024.

The prize was judged by Beatrice Gralton, the Senior Curator of the Brett Whitely Studio at the Art Gallery of New South Wales. In her comments, she congratulated all the artists for their efforts and said that it was clear that watercolour practice continues to thrive with artists finding new ways of working with the medium.

"Natalya's art probes the complexities of representation of women in art history and the role of the female subject within the trajectory of modernism," Gralton wrote.

"Her fascinating work is a reminder that art is produced within a nuanced set of social conditions, and this includes contemporary practice.''

Three others were also commended for their works: Leah Bullen with Underland No.1, Penelope Mason with Pine Lake, and Paul Miller with Close to the Cascades.

Read more: Of Mice and Men spin-off for Wollongong's neurodiverse theatre company

Of the finalists on display, Gralton said there was a strong interest in the beauty of our natural world, along with urban life, portraiture and botanical studies.

FLOW is a biennial acquisitive competition that's open to artists from around Australia and aims to encourage innovation and experimentation in watercolour painting, including works on paper in watercolour, acrylic, gouache, pen and ink, and watercolour mixed media.

For more details, visit: www.wollongongartgallery.com.

Reading this on mobile web? Download our news app. It's faster, easier to read and we'll send you alerts for breaking news as it happens. Download in the Apple Store or Google Play.