Congratulations to our 2023 Roy McComish Art Award Winners

Posted: 20 October 2023

At the Closing ceremony of last week’s Round Square International Conference at Brookhouse Schools in Nairobi, Kenya, this year’s recipients of the Roy McComish Art Award were announced.

Each year, in the run up to the RSIC, students from across the Round Square network are invited to create art inspired by the Conference theme. This year, the theme was “The New Africa”, and a fantastic range of artwork was entered, showcasing some wonderful talent from across the world. The judges selected one winner in each age category, with additional works being Highly Commended.

In the age category of 11 years and under, the judges highly commended Amayra Arya, aged 11, from The Shri Ram School, Aravali, Aekum Chugh, aged 11 from Genesis Global School, Noida, and Raya Kaur Chhatwal, aged 7, from GEMS Modern Academy. The winner in this category was Preenan Prapti, aged 9, from Maria’s Public School.

In the age category of 12-15 years, the judges highly commended Han Le, aged 15, from Havergal College, Hiya Dhiraaj, aged 14, from The Shri Ram School, and Divyangana Sinh, aged 15, from Mayo College Girls’ School. The winner in this category was Riya Maurya, aged 14, from Sunbeam School Lahartara.

In the age category of 16-18 years, the judges highly commended Emma Van der Waal, aged 16, from Bridge House School, Tsering Lazes, aged 18, from All Saints’ College, and Sankalp Gupta, aged 17, from Welham Boys’ School. The winner in this category was Eli Coblenz, aged 16, from Providence Day School.

The winners each received a pair of Kenyan sculptures as their prize, and all winners and those highly commended will be sent a certificate to recognise their achievements.

The Award is named after Roy McComish, who was the founding Headmaster of Box Hill School, and before that, a Master at Gordonstoun School, two of the schools that formed the Round Square community. Roy also led an international group of a hundred students who volunteered to help in the wake of earthquakes in Greece in 1955, and this became the inspiration for what later became the Round Square International Service Project. As one of the important people in the history of Round Square, we remember Roy, who was an Art Master, in the presentation of this award.