The winners of the VICTA Braille Art competition 2023 are in! We had so many incredible entries and can’t wait to share them all with you. Well done to all of the entrants, we were so impressed by the standard of art and creativity.
Clarke in the VICTA office feeling the artwork, with all of the entries laid out on the table
Clarke smiling at the camera holding up one of the winning entries – a seaside scene
We would like to say a big thank you to our judge, Clarke Reynolds, a blind braille artist who produces art you can touch as well as see, making it accessible to vision impaired people.
Clarke was blown away by the talent and ideas behind the art and we were proud to share your work with our professional artist!
You can find out more about Clarke Reynolds on his website: seeingwithoutseeing.com
Category 1 – braille your name (age: 0 to 10 years)
1st place, Olivia, age 6
Congratulations to our winner of the braille your name competition, Olivia, who used magnets to represent her name!
Olivia’s mum tells us: “She brailled her name in colourful square magnets in the braille cell and attached them to the warm radiator for a tactile reading experience in her bedroom! She was very proud of herself.”
Our guest judge, braille artist Clarke Reynolds, loved Olivia’s entry, commenting: “Amazing. Use of an everyday household item, a radiator. I love the braille being square!”
Image description: Olivia smiling and pointing at her braille creation. Square-shaped magnets, all different bright colours, have been arranged along a long radiator to represent her name in the braille cell.
Runner-up, Etta, age 6
Congratulations to our runner-up, Etta, who came second with her glittery, clay, braille creation!
Etta was very excited to take part and worked hard setting her raised dots into a slab of air-drying clay. Once set, she covered her art in silver, purple, and gold glitter. Well done Etta!
Image description: Etta smiling holding up her glittery clay slab which has her name brailled onto it.
Category 2 – braille in pictures! (Age: 11 to 29 years)
1st place, Freya, age 12
‘The Seaside with Sunset’. Freya layered coloured paper to represent the sky, sand and sea, each with descriptions such as ‘calm’, ‘bright and vivid’ and ‘waves splashing’ brailled onto the paper. The artwork has the extra tactile element of three real seashells sitting on the sand.
Our judge, Clarke Reynolds, told us that Freya’s use of sandpaper to represent the sand was genius! Well done Freya!
Image description: Freya’s artwork, strips of blue paper, represent the sky, yellow sandpaper for the beach and light blue, pink and orange for the sea. All of the strips have been brailled onto, and three seashells are sitting on the beach.
Runner-up, Key Stage 3 student at New College Worcester
This stunning flamingo design has layers of card feathers each brailled with the words ‘feather’. Well done, it’s beautiful!
Image description: Background coloured with felt tips and an outline of a flamingo, which has been coloured pink. The body is covered with strips of pink card with the words ‘feather’ brailled onto them, giving a lovely textured effect.
The gallery – under 10s
Benji, age 8
Benji used tea light candles because they small amazing and he has always loved lights. He arranged the candles into cells if 6 and has lit the candles for the dots he needs to use to represent his name.
Brady, age 6
Brady has arranged ‘kugeli beads’ which are plastic balls with holes through them, to represent the braille for his name. He used different colours for the different letters.
Siana, age 6
Siana used goggly eyes for the monster’s eyes, to represent her name in Grade 1 braille. She has decorated the monsters with glitter.
Dexter, age 7
“I used Fimo planets and stars from our solar system to make my name. I had to use some blue tac to hold them in place because they kept rolling away.”
Dexter’s models are detailed representations of the planets and stars, with different colours and sizes to represent them.
Shane, age 9
Shane’s entry illustrates the multiple ways he learns braille. The ‘s’ is a peg board, ‘h’ a pop-it, ‘a’ a pin, ‘n’ using LEGO and ‘e’ with eggs in a carton.
Josiah, age 1
Josiah has arranged toy balls which are all different sensory shapes and textures onto a foam playmat.
Lilly, age 9
Lilly has stuck different objects onto pink paper to represent her name in braille. She has used foam shapes, plastic objects, wooden discs, seashells and gems.
Sophia, age 8
Sophia has used six-holed pop-its as her braille cell, she has then placed marble into the holes of the dots she needs to represent her name.
Brody, age 7
Brody is passionate about LEGO and dreams of becoming an inventor! Brody is holding a blue LEGO board above his head smiling. It features his name in LEGO, a tree, car and a cloud.
Ted, age 7
Ted has made the letters of his name from LEGO and then used the alphabet letters to represent each braille dot. It’s a lovely idea as non-braille readers can also read his name!
Ralph, age 7
“Ralph is partially sighted and has Ocular Albinism and Nystagmus. Ralph has recently started to learn braille to help with his reading skills. Ralph often says it’s likes a secret code!”
Ralph used different coloured pom poms to create his name in braille – the photo shows him smiling, holding up his art.
Maia, age 7
Maia has made her braille name with circular objects, coins, buttons and pom-poms.
Zac, age 8
Zac is football mad and despite being registered blind he loves playing with his local teams. He wanted to show his love for football by brailling his name with footballs.
Aalyan, age 7
Aalyan is new to braille. He used the mosaic tiles to braille his name on to a person made of card.
Aizah, age 8
Aizah used mosaic tiles to represent her name in Grade 1 braille. She arranged them onto a shield she made which has a tactile outline.
Ibrahim, age 6
Ibrahim brailled his name in Grade 1 braille using mosaic tiles. He placed them onto the playground of a model he has made of his school.
Yash, age 6
Yash has made a rocket model using green card and decorated it with circular sequins to represent the braille letters.
Maida, age 8
Maida has created a picture of a tree using cut out sugar paper. She has added feathered leaves and paper butterflies using paper folded in a concertina. Beneath the picture she has used polystyrene balls to represent her name in braille.
The gallery – 10 plus
Amelie, age 14
Amelie has drawn a woodland tree and used black beads in the shape of brailled words to represent the leaves – they read ‘fox, ant, squirrel, deer and bird.’
Ellie, age 10
Ellie has cut out coloured paper to create a picture of a yellow flower surrounded by orange bees on a green background. Texture has been added to the artwork using braille dots to create patterns.
Bella, age 16
Bella has used 21 Rubik’s cubes with blue and white squares. The blue squares represent where the braille would be and spell out her name in braille.
Hannah, age 15
“To create the artwork I thought of words that link to the meaning of the word connections. I felt that care, friendship and love were the right words for me to use when thinking of connection with others. To bring all three words together I wanted to use a love heart. I wanted to use flowers for the Braille but instead used felt hearts and flowers to link the artwork together more.”
The photo shows Hannah holding up her large pink cut-out paper heart and decorated with felt hearts to represent the braille.
Dayzie, age 14
“I have used a perkins brailler to create a four leaf clover. It represents connections to me as a four leaf clover symbolises luck and to have a connection with someone or something, you are very lucky. The other reason is that a clover has four leaves, and the little leaves are like four different people or communities coming together to build that connection.”
Dayzie’s image description: a four leaf clover the size of a medium sized hand with a stem coming out to it’s bottom right. A four leaf clover is shaped a bit like a flower but it has four petals which are quite dominant. Underneath the four leaf clover on the same piece of card in braille says: “connections are like a four leaf clover, it feels like four small groups of communities coming together connecting. By Dayzie, age 14”
George, age 14
George has based his art on motorways and their connections. Raised shapes represent the shapes of road signs and he has brailled lots of information about different motorways and where they lead to.
George, age 11
George’s art is of a skyscraper and buildings at sunset. He has painted a blended sky in the background and then used brailled shiny gold and silver paper, which has been cut-out and stuck on top, to represent the buildings.
Honey, age 12
Honey’s art depicts an ocean with the sky above it. The ocean is full of fish, with a larger fish swimming off. She has cut out the large fish and attached it using a blue ribbon so that it can swim around.
Joe, age 11
Joe has created a tactile drawing with raised lines of a face. He has coloured in the face with bright blue felt tip pend and a red mouth. He has labelled the different features using braille – ‘ear, eye, nose mouth’.
Jamie, age 13
Jamie has made a braille car crossword to fit the theme of ‘connections’. He has made the crossword grid using different coloured card and then cut out braille letters to sit within the grid. The letters spell the names of car brands such as ‘Land Rover’.
Isobel, age 12
Isobel has used grade 2 braille to create a map onto white paper – she has made a grid and filled it with fictional locations.
Karan, age 11
Karan has made a tactile tree with real leaves. Karen has made his picture tactile by using corrugated card for the trunk, five real leaves for the tree branches and cotton wool clouds. Karan has spelt out his name using flowers to represent the braille letters.
Natalie, age 13
Natalie has made a bee that can fly between the hive and the flower. Natalie has cut a flower from shiny purple card and covered it with a tactile braille pattern. The hive is made from gold and cream card. She has made a bee from yellow card with braille dot outlines. The bee is attached to transparent Perspex which feeds into a slot in the card and is attached to a split pin. This allows the user to move the bee between flower and the hive.
Jesse, age 10
Jesse used braille to make a birthday picture for Louis Braille. He has cut out coloured card and arranged onto black paper in the shape of a birthday cake with three candles. There are four yellow stars around it. On the cake, he has brailled the word ‘cake’ in a repeating pattern. Underneath it reads ‘Happy birthday Louis, by Jesse’
Emily, age 12
Emily has cut out a white paper snowflake and stuck it onto blue card with snowflake-shaped gems. She has written a poem in braille above it:
Snowflakes fluttering in the white snowy air
Snowflakes fluttered and look so pretty everywhere
Lawson, age 12
Lawson painted a garden with beautiful flowers. There are brown, black, blue, yellow, red and orange flowers with a blue sky, sun and green grass. She has brailled this message underneath: ‘I have done a garden. I have done some lovely flowers in braille and the sticks look pretty and I hope you like it. I spent a lot of time doing it.’
Laurel, age 18
Laurel loves making braille pictures and worked hard to create her Perkins panda for the competition. She has used her brailler to create a cute panda face.
Lily-Grace, age 14
Lily-Grace has used a brailler to create rows of repeating patterns using different letters formed by braille dots.
Maxwell, age 12
Maxwell has created a blue house from braille code. He has used braille dots to create the outline of a house and garden. He has coloured the house and surroundings using felt tip pens.
Phoebe, age 14
Phoebe is really interested in science and wanted to make a rocket. She made her rocket from a card tube and covered it in red paper. It has a tin foil window, a gold cone-shaped pointed top and tissue paper flames which are made from red, orange and yellow strips. Phoebe has used braille to label the different parts of the rocket.
Roman, age 14
Roman has made ‘two wolves in a pack’. The wolves have raised outlines and have been decorated in a mosaic-style using brown textured paper. Between the two wolves Roman has added words written in braille which read ‘connection, bond, brother, love, relation, friendship, sister, cherish, mates and wolves’.
Ruqaiya, age 20
Ruqaiya has named her artwork ‘Colourful Connections’. She has painted a canvas blue and created flowers using silk textured fabric, which has been gathered and secured with coloured pins. The flowers are positioned around the edge of the canvas and a plaited wool chain, weaves along, connecting all of the flowers. In the centre of the artwork, Ruqaiya has used braille dots to display the following text:
Working together
Like a chain
As fluffy as a feather
Never be alone in the rain
Stevie, age 13
Stevie has created a collage of herself riding a horse. All of the paper elements in the collage have been brailled with patterns to create a tactile effect. The horse Stevie is riding is extra tactile with scrunched paper and sparkly wool for the mane and tail. She has made a stable which uses lollipop sticks for the door. The different elements of the horse have been labelled using braille. On the door, Stevie has brailled the following text:
Horses are fun
Our best friends
Riding is fun
Saddle up
Enjoying every minute
Zander, age 13
Zander has called his artwork ‘Dragon – Majesty and Power’. He has used a brailler to create the shape of a majestic dragon flying.
Kacey, age 13
Kacey has used German Film – a technique for producing raised, tactile drawings. She has drawn a family of three people and called her artwork ‘Family Connections’. The people have been labelled using braille reading ‘mum, me and sister’.
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