Wrapping paper art contest winner Britton Williams holds a package wrapped with paper featuring her winning design.The Readers' Choice AwardElanor Cornett, 10, a fifth-grader at Thrasher Elementary School, is the winner of the online Readers' Choice Award, garnering one-third of the more than 300 votes.
Mary Williams of Signal Mountain encourages her daughters, Britton and Callan, to be creative by having art supplies readily available throughout their home. So, whenever they're in the mood, the Thrasher Elementary School students can create an art masterpiece.
Thanks to their mom's encouragement, their art teacher's skills and their natural talent, the girls each have nabbed a first-place title in the Times Free Press annual Wrapping Paper Design Contest. Britton, a fourth-grader, won this year with her Nutcracker soldier and Christmas tree design. Callan, a third-grader, won second place for her hot chocolate and chocolate chip cookie design. Last year, Callan won first place in the contest.
Britton admitted to being "a little" competitive with her younger sister -- even in art.
"I was a little jealous when she won last year," Britton says. "But I was happy for her, too."
"When they got off the school bus and told me they had won, I started screaming. We were in shock," their mother says. "I know how many people enter the contest. I knew her drawing was colorful and easy to see. Even Callan told her she had a good chance of winning."
The winning wrapping paper designs are included in today's newspaper. Chattanooga's Kids on the Block will offer the winner's design as a choice in its gift wrap booth at Hamilton Place through Dec. 24.
Williams says the girls' talent is a reflection of the skills of Nancy Stagmaier, the art teacher at Thrasher. Not only did the Williams girls win, so did Tally Pierce, a first-grader at Thrasher, who placed third in the contest. Tally used her inked thumbprints to make reindeer bodies.
"The students get very excited each year when I present the contest rules," says Stagmaier, who has taught art at Thrasher for 11 years. "Some tell me they think of ideas all year and save them for the contest."
While her students come up with their own designs for the art contest, Stagmaier says she offers guidance.
"When I teach the wrapping paper lesson plan, I tell them patterns are important," she says. "We look at past winners (I have saved every one). We talk about how color is very important in their designs. We start them in art class and they finish them at home. I give them the deadline and bring them to the paper."
Williams says her daughters draw "rough drafts" at home before they decided what to draw for the contest.
"They talk to me about their ideas, but they decide on what they want to do. It's something they really enjoy," she says. "Britton decided to focus on the Nutcracker. She dances with Tennessee Ballet and is in the Nutcracker. She came up with the design."
Williams, who works at Alexian Village retirement center on Signal Mountain, says she has no artistic talent, but her husband, local audiologist Ames Williams, does. "He doodles, but he's good at it."
"It is awesome to have two winners under the same roof," their father says.
Times Free Press designer Lin Parker, who manages the wrapping paper contest, says there were hundreds of entries from Chattanooga and regional public and private schools, as well as home schoolers.
"Red Bank Elementary second-graders sent their entries in a 12-seater art car that looked like a giant Radio Flyer wagon," says Parker, noting that the car was made available by Art 120, a nonprofit art organization.
Judges for the contest were Rodney Van Valkenburg, Julie Jackson and Jessica Wright, of ArtsBuild; Carmen Peace from Chattanooga's Kids on the Block, and Parker and fellow Times Free Press designer Sara Jackson. Judges do not know the names of the students or where they go to school at the time of judging.
"We hang all the entries on glass windows facing out into the newsroom, so judges don't see students' names or schools when judging," Parker says. "That why it was a surprise that the first-, second-, and third-place winners were all from Thrasher Elementary. We have never had sibling finalists or a previous winner who placed again."
Contact Karen Nazor Hill at khill@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6396.