NLAPW Announces Collaborative Competition

cross-gender competitionNLAPW is launching a new, cross-genre competition designed to encourage collaboration among Pen Women. 

Competition teams may be made up of Pen Women within one branch, multiple branches, or members-at-large. Each team must be made up of at least two and up to four Pen Women. 

All entries will be anonymously judged by professionals in their respective areas of concentration. Judges will not be NLAPW members. 

The intent behind the competition is to inspire new creative and collaborative projects across genres (not ones repurposed for this competition). All project submissions must be original creations made within one year before or after competition launch (two-year window). 

Prizes 

Two first prizes to two teams will be awarded by judges: one for each of the two best overall team entries. The winning teams may come from the same category or different categories. In other words, there may be two winners from arts and letters, or there may be two winners from music and arts, etc. 

Each first prize is an award of $300, to be evenly divided between the members of the winning team. 

Rules 

Contributions from nonmembers are not allowed. The final creative project must involve two to four Pen Women from any branch or the same branch working in different genres and show collaboration among Pen Women in any of the following genres: 

  • Arts and letters 
  • Letters and music 
  • Music and arts

Examples: The final creative project submitted for competition may be a musical composition with original lyrics; a work of art with thematically related or ekphrastic written essay, poem, or story; a literary work in any genre accompanied by a thematically related work of art or music; a chapbook of ekphrastic poetry and art, etc. 

The cross-genre project should demonstrate the interrelatedness of the arts.

All projects will be submitted online, with the competition application form available on the NLAPW website. Written work should be sent via doc or PDF through email. Artwork should be sent via jpegs, and music should be sent via MP3 files. All work may be collected and sent as a Zip file. 

The application form should be filled out, scanned, and sent with the project entry. Entry fees may be paid via PayPal online or check sent to NLAPW. 

Letters, art, and music chairs will each appoint a judge with professional qualifications in their respective fields. All applications and projects will be sent to the three judges, who will review the work, choose finalists, and select the two winning entries. 

There must be at least 12 entries overall in order to hold a valid competition and for prizes to be awarded. If competition entry numbers do not meet that threshold, all entry fees will be returned. No submissions will be returned.

Fees and Deadline 

Submission fee for each creative work/team: $50 total. Deadline for the competition is May 2, 2025.

Download the competition form and submission instructions.