Congratulations to Marian Borromeo, in Year 10, who entered a digitally coloured moth antenna drawing in the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANTSO) competition.
“I remembered that the results should be out, so I checked – and there was my picture in the top 10 artworks in the High School division” – Marian
“I entered the competition because my science teacher, Mrs Kiersten Walker, posted it in our Google Classroom and there was also a small prize, so I thought ‘Why not?’” said Marian.
“Since I was new to digital colouring, I searched YouTube on how to colour a black-and-white photo and it came up with a Photoshop video” – Marian
The competition
The competition required primary and secondary students from across Australia to digitally colour close-up images of insects taken by ANTSO’s powerful Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM).
One hundred and fourteen primary and 64 high school students in Kindergarten up to Year 11 submitted entries.
ANSTO scientist, Dr Daniel Oldfield, who blind-judged the entries, found it “an extremely difficult choice.”
“The competition allowed students to express their creativity while appreciating the advancements in Science and the incredible detail observed through SEM,” said Year 10 Science teacher, Mrs Kiersten Walker.
“Several students in my classes are very artistic, including Marian who does the most amazing title pages for each of our Science units.”
Combining art and science
Marian said she loved Art and tried to incorporate it into all her subjects, not just Science.
She felt it was important to combine Art and Science in particular, “to allow all people – not just people around my age or younger – to express themselves creatively, while also learning more about the fundamentals of Science.”
Mrs Walker said while Science and Art were not often associated together, they actually went hand-in-hand.
“Art involves creativity, imagination and abstract thinking,” she said. “These attributes are vital in science, as well.”
Mrs Walker commended all her students for the “time, effort and imagination” they put into their ANTSO competition entries.