The competition, first incepted in 2017 in South Africa and expanded across Africa in 2019, encourages talent across Africa and the Middle East to showcase their creativity and create a piece of art using the Bic Ball Pen.
This year, the competition expanded even further to include the Middle East, reaching more than 3,700 artists. The winners included one continent-wide winner as well as 11 winners from countries within the Africa region.
Ugandan artist Gayi Eric was named the 2021 Bic Art Master of Africa for his portrait titled ‘Circle of Life’ that was created using four Bic Ball Pens and took a total of 210 hours to complete.
Cameroon’s Kamgaing took the second spot for his art piece titled ‘In My Room’, while Nigerian artist Odaro Franklin Osaivbie won the third price for his ‘Entranced’ artwork. South Africa’s Astral Msekeli (sixth place for ‘Ubuntu’ artwork), Thuso modikela (seventh place for Flowers of the Universe art piece) and Ashaba Gabito (ninth place for ‘Roll the Dice’ artwork) made it to the top 10 list of winners.
National winners across Africa were also announced and include:
The creative artwork was chosen from 6,350 entries submitted by more than 3,700 artists from 52 countries across the Middle East and Africa. Artists were requested to submit their creative work through the campaign’s dedicated microsite, BicArtMaster.com.
The work was shortlisted by a panel of judges including experts from Bic, renowned artists from the region, winners from previous Art Master Africa competitions and art experts from Europe. Among the judges was previous South African Bic Art Master winner Ennock Mlangeni.
“With the competition expanding into the Middle East this year, we are confident that we will continue to motivate and shine a bright light on talent across the region creating a future generation of creative and inspiring individuals,” Van den Broeck said.