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A "last-minute" entry has turned out to be a major award winner.
Oamaru artist Dean Raybould was the Supreme Award winner at the 2025 Cleveland National Art Awards with his work gHosttrunk at the Dunedin Railway Station last night.
Raybould — who said he put forward his entry "at the last minute" — was delighted to win the Supreme Award.
"I didn't really expect it at all, to be honest."
The work was about "the history of loss of habitat and species".
It featured the mould of a resin bird among the painted birds.
"That's kind of there because a lot of the subject matter is kind of playing with the wording of ghost and host — the clear bird heads in my work are basically ghost birds really."
Raybould said the work took a few months to pull together.
"That one needed a lot of work to actually stabilise the trunk before I could paint on it, because some of the wood was coming off it and a lot of the original covering was going on it.
"So you need to make sure they're OK to actually paint on to begin with."
He was unsure how people would respond to the work.
"I can't actually put expectations on art.
"You just kind of do it and then throw it out in the world and see what happens."
The evening was hosted by the Otago Arts Society and the judges were Gore District Council arts and heritage department head Jim Geddes and Eastern Southland Gallery, Gore, programmes officer Marcella Geddes.
Raybould’s work — and others — will be on display at the Dunedin Railway Station until April 26.