The Mistletoe Sculpture Prize is an encouragement award open to the students of Fine Art at the University of Newcastle.

The Mistletoe sponsorship is now in excess of $8500 with a first prize of $2500, a runner-up encouragement award of $500.

The remaining funds are allocated to students to fund the cost of materials for their entries.

The rationale behind this materials funding is to enable students who don’t have sufficient financial resources to participate in the award.

The 2009 prize was judged by Anna Eggert together with Ken and Gwen Sloan from Mistletoe.

Anna is a successful sculptor who graduated with a Fine Art degree from the ANU in Canberra in 1991.

Among many other successes she has exhibited in Sculpture by The Sea (Sydney 2002) ,National Sculpture Prize 2003 at the National Gallery of Australia and the Helen Lempriere National Sculpture Award 2008.

The winner of the 2009 Mistletoe Sculpture Prize is Tomoko Iwahashi with her entry entitled Sunny Spot. Congratulations Tomoko for a well deserved win!

In addition to the prize winner Mistletoe has purchased an additional 3 works from the entrants in the award. These sculptures will also become part of the permanent exhibition at Mistletoe.

When next visiting Mistletoe be sure to allow enough time to wander around and see the wonderful work of this next generation on artists.

Mistletoe Sculpture Garden is open from 10am until 6pm every day.