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Alvin student wins rodeo art award
Published May 8, 2008
ALVIN — When Austin Carleton walked into an assembly at school Wednesday morning, the 12-year-old thought it was to learn rules for an upcoming field day.
The sixth-grade Alvin Elementary student was sitting up front with his parents and the rest of the students from the school when Reliant Energy representatives told him he beat out 11,000 art entries for the 2008 Power of Art contest at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo.
“I was kind of wondering why my mom was telling me to smile,” Carleton said with a shy smile.
Carleton drew a depiction of a horse running through a prairie with map pencils for his entry. Online voters picked three to win the award among 25 finalists, said Sandi Earle, project manager for Reliant Energy’s sports marketing department.
“His work was fabulous,” she said. “This one seems to (be) more realistic,” than other entries.
Carleton received a gift bag that included a $100 gift certificate to Target. Organizers also awarded Alvin Elementary with $1,000 for art supplies and $1,000 in art supplies for Alvin ISD.
Carleton drew his winning entry several months ago in art class, he said.
“The hard work paid off,” he said.
As a student, Carleton is always asking questions about how he can make his work better.
“He’s just an amazing artist,” said Michael Somers, Carleton’s art teacher. “He has a lot going for him.”
Carleton loves to draw and sketches constantly in class, Somers said. He also helps other students with their work, he said.
“He’s like the Energizer Bunny with the pencil,” said Somers, who has taught Austin for three years.
Carleton’s parents, Kevin and Lisa Carleton, say their son is forever drawing and especially loves drawing cartoons. He’ll watch television at times and then draw something he sees, Kevin Carleton said.
“He’ll freeze it and then go back and draw it,” he said.
Austin Carleton elected to take lessons in cartoon drawing and animation for a one-week course he will take in June at the Glassel School of Art in Houston, Lisa Carleton said.
The contest is open to elementary students, and organizers said they received entries from 95 area school districts. Carleton received 14,000 votes for his entry.
Part of the reason he received so many votes is because school district officials helped spread the word after they realized Carleton had been named a finalist, Earle said.
This is the second year for the program, which was created to help identify younger artists, she said. Too often, older students would win the lion’s share of scholarships from the rodeo’s annual art contests, she said.
“We wanted to recognize our younger talent,” Earle said.
John Tompkins is senior reporter for The Facts. Contact him at (979) 237-0149.
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