The winning teams are:
- Lucy Arnold (Golden Gate-Marin Branch) and Georgia Popoff (Central New York Branch) for “Rhapsody in Blue”
- Cynthia Pederson and Barbara Waterman-Peters (Topeka Branch) for “Sijo Sojourns”
Congratulations to these four Pen Women on winning the inaugural competition.
The runner-up team was Jamie Tate (Delta Branch) and Nancy Dafoe (CNY Branch) for “Got Some River in Us.”
As with the Vinnie Ream competition, cash prizes for the cross-genre competition will be awarded at the 2026 Biennial in Washington, D.C.
Competition judges commented on the overall high quality of all the entries and the very tough decisions they had to make. Judges also remarked on the difficulty of weighing large projects with long works beside very concise projects, noting the remarkable quality ran through every entry.
Finalists (in no particular order):
• Nancy Haskett and Chella Gonsalves (Modesto Branch) for “A Visual Epilogue”
• Linda Brown Carlson, Cindy McGonagle, and Marge Dodge (Palm Springs Branch) for “Ancient Palm Speaks”
• Anne Baehr, Genevieve Fortner, Karen Morris, and Mara Viksnins (Pensacola Branch) for “Destinations”
• Bev Goldie (Central Ohio Branch) and Elizabeth Yahn Williams (MAL) for “Comparing and Contrasting Two Encaustic Creations”
• Stephanie Pyren Fortel and Susanne Schuenke (Jacksonville Branch) for “Let the Painting Sing”
• Sandra K. Horn and Karin Dahl (Central Ohio Branch) for “Reflections of Color in Characters”
• Terry Dusseau (Central Ohio Branch) and Gretchen Martens (CNY Branch) for “Echoes of a Forgotten Life”
• Doris Mady and Judy Crystal (Greenwich Branch) for “Blue Bayou and Autumn’s Tree”
• Janice Newman and Joan Kantor (Sarasota Branch) for “Art to Art: From Painter to Poet and Poet to Painter”
• Darlene Yeager-Torre (Central Ohio Branch) and Nancy Dafoe (CNY Branch) for “Phantom Corals, A Warning”