The winners and highly commended artists of the Art Beyond the Divide 2025 exhibition smile together on opening night. Photo: Rosemary Scott
The breadth and talent of local artists was celebrated at this year’s well-attended Art Beyond the Divide exhibition.
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Reports of the opening night on Friday, November 28 revealed that a huge turnout of attendees flooded the exhibition at Wine X Sam, which remained on display on Saturday, November 29 and Sunday, November 30.
And after three busy days of showcasing the arts on a local level, hosting group Seymour and District Art Society president Terri MacDonald couldn’t express her gratitude for the event’s supporters enough.
Seymour Art Society president Terri MacDonald with most outstanding in show awardee Chris Anderson, his 3D artwork ‘Freedom’ and judge Nina Volk. Photo: Rosemary Scott.
“A huge thank you, as always, to Wine X Sam, to Sam himself, for letting the crazy artists into the winery for a weekend. He’s been a great supporter — the whole team at Wine X Sam is just fantastic,” she said.
“Also, to all the hard-working volunteers that we have in the art society, every single one of us is a volunteer.
“And, a huge thank you to our sponsors, our supporters, the friends of the gallery, to our judges, and, of course, to our artists because we need them. There’s no show without them.”
Twenty-two artworks were commended across 12 categories, with almost 300 works submitted to be judged by Nina Volk and Anton Fenech.
This year’s Seymour challenge, which calls for works depicting a particular aspect of town, brought in a number of entries portraying the Old Courthouse building on Emily St, which is home to the Seymour and District Art Society.
The new 3D category was a hit, too, with the most outstanding in show awarded to a sculpture for the first time — Chris Anderson taking home the prize for Freedom.
Nearly 300 works were submitted to be displayed, with works perused by the many attendees at opening night.
Photo by
Simon Ruppert
“What I think is good is our judge giving the best in show to a sculpture because that, in the art world, is relatively unusual,” Ms MacDonald said.
“I think it’s important that sculptures are acknowledged, and it’s great to see this kind of recognition — I know the winner was incredibly stoked to find out he had won.
“All the sculptures were fantastic, we had such a diverse range because it was a new category we were really hoping we would get some great entries, and we got more than that. We got fantastic entries.”
While this year marked yet another successful Art Beyond the Divide, it’s only onwards and upwards for the art society, which will now take on board the feedback received after the event and continue to deliver aspects of it that people loved.
Above all, the exhibition will always work to spotlight the talents within the community.
“We do this to showcase our established and recognised artists, and we have a lot of them in our area who are really well known in the art world,” Ms MacDonald said.
“We also try to promote those who are emerging and up and coming — the new talent.
“When we have such a wealth of creativity in the shire, in our region, we would love to have it more recognised.”
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