THREE trophies have been awarded to the winners of an art society’s summer exhibition but everyone who exhibited came in for praise from the judges.

St Albans Arts Society’s annual exhibition runs at the Town Hall until this Saturday (27) and is open daily from 10am to 6pm with free entry.

The winner of the Terry Biggs Cup for the overall exhibition winner was Clive Patterson with Changing Leaves. He is a long-standing member of the society who exhibits in a number of galleries including the Cork Street Gallery in London.

Another established local artist Bridget Tompkins took the St Albans Trophy for the work judged to best capture the distinctive character of the city in an original way. Her winning work was entitled Verulamium, Late Spring.

And the winner of the Challenge Trophy judged to show the most originality and freshness of vision was young artist Emma Hollins who is just starting out on her career and exhibited Emerging Image: Linear Abstraction.

The exhibition features a varied selection of paintings, sculpture, glassware and greetings cards ranging from traditional to contemporary and abstract, all of which can be seen on the Society’s website www.stalbans-artsociety.org.uk

In their comments, the judges praised craftsmanship, the type of marks, choice of colour palette, sense of space and perspective and the value of showing several works.

They felt the best work came from artists who were very aware that they were making an “object” not simply pretending to be a camera.

n St Albans Mayor, Cllr Annie Brewster, took time out from her busy make-over project in the area outside the Old Town Hall to visit the exhibition.

She was shown around the exhibits, particularly the entries for the St Albans Trophy.