Great Neck-based Champkids is an organization dedicated to providing student-artists opportunities to practice their skills and display their passion. On May 12, the organization hosted its first event, a live drawing and coloring competition for kids, at the Long Island Children’s Museum, where almost 200 people gathered to create art, spend time with family and friends, and check out the unique exhibitions on display.
The event began with an informal assembly in the museum lobby for all of the contestants to register. This was also the time for attendees to become familiar with the various vendors who sponsored the event. One of the vendor, Long Island Parents ran its own raffle for a Family Pack trip to the Empire State Fair.
During the competition, students between grades K-12 spent 45 to 90 minutes completing a work of art about the theme “Celebrate Mother’s Day!” The participants were split into three categories based on their grade level. Those between grades K-2 were given a pre-made design to color in. Grades 3-5 were given a frame design within which they drew and colored their own image. Grades 6-12 were given a blank page to create their own work.
The judging panel was composed of art professionals from a variety of fields. It included the aforementioned Barbara Silbert, who spent 30 years working as an Art Director, Design, and Illustrator; Jennifer Kelly, an art teacher for the Roslyn School District; Xiangdong Shi, an award-winning artist whose work has been displayed all over the world; and Michelle Palatnik, an award-winning artist and a member of the prestigious Salmagundi Art Club.
“The way that we judged was based on six criteria,” said Michelle, who spoke on behalf of the panel during the closing award ceremony, “they are presentation, creativity, aesthetic, passion, appropriateness to the theme, and skills.”
During the award ceremony, Fenella Kim and her daughter, Allena, the co-founders of Champkids, also shared their story of how they started the company. “While athletic kids get the benefit of sports competition, Champkids provide kids who are non athletic but are creative a platform to compete and shine. Through live art competition we give opportunity to participants to develop life long skill sets such as determination, creativity, imagination, self-confidence, time management and winning mindset.”
In the end, the Top 3 winners from each category were awarded huge trophies and gift baskets that included more than $1,000 worth of prizes. These include art supplies from Blick Art, soft toy blankets from The Northwest Company, Kwik Stix from The Pencil Grip, custom notepads from HSBC, and other contributions from Massage Envy, NEFCU, and Pamela Spencer.
Here are the winners for each category:
Category K-2
First: Maxine Tian
Second: Jocelyn Chang
Third: Aaliyah E. Lopez
Category 3-5
First: Jilian Zhang
Second: Lauren Tan
Third: Alston Leung
Category 6-12
First: Stanley Huang
Second: Peter Sansky-Traficanti
Third: Samantha Labriola
Champkids partnered and supports Big Brothers and Big Sisters and among the winners there were two participant presented by the non for profit organization won the competition.
The major event sponsors were HSBC Bank, Shining Smiles Pediatric Dentistry, and the Port Washington Skating Center. Other sponsors and supporters were New York Life, the Jason F. Gruen Research Foundation, NEFCU, The Pencil Grip, Blick Art, The Northwest Company, Massage Envy, The Big Brothers Big Sisters of Long Island, and Pamela Spencer. Finally, the media sponsors for the evening were NYMetroParents, Anton Media, and Schneps Communications.
