Collecting more than 10 percent of over 2,000 votes cast, Japanese-born, Australian Capital Territory artist Akie Haga has won the $5,000 People’s Choice Award for Soft Echo – a flameworked borosilicate glass sculpture composed of translucent blossoms and branching growths. Inspired by the quiet presence of flannel flowers, the glass crown is a meditation on belonging, memory, and renewal.
Akie Haga with Soft Echo / Photograph: Brooke McEachern / Courtesy the artist and South Australian Museum, South Australia
Deb McKay won the $30,000 Open category for The Ghosts of our Coastal Water and Kat Parker the $10,000 Emerging Artist category for Discarded (Christmas Island Pipistrelle).
