I entered the Art Category for the British Airways Great Britons competition to design the exterior surfaces of their aeroplanes – it was the ideal opportunity to showcase my work on 12 BA aeroplanes flying around the world.  It couldn’t get any better!

[Thanks to Cara Pirie who helped me with my film clip]

The competition linked to the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games; and I created a design especially for it as I thought my style would capture the excitement and drama of the Olympics!

After submitting 3 images (as above), a 2 minute film and 500 words, I was so excited to be shortlisted and to be in the final 10!  I received a giant posted parcel, with lots of exciting goodies from BA – a model plane, colour swatches and profile drawings and CD of BA planes, interview guidelines.  I loved the glossy swatches of paint!

The shortlist selection was held in the Royal Academy of Arts in London; where I had to give a 10 minute presentation and interview in front of a very high-profile panel – Tracey Emin (artist),  Eliza Bonham Carter (Curator of Royal Academy), Luiza Fernandez (British Airways), David Barnes (British Airways).  You can image how nerve racking that was!  And to top it off there was a film crew and I had to be miked up!

Here’s me sitting waiting patiently! Portfolio – check! artwork – check! power point – check! nerves – check! Psychological pee – check!

I wanted to engage the panel to visualise my work in 3D, so I got them to make a paper aeroplane and fly them as part of my presentation.  I was a bit apprehensive about asking them to do it but they were up for the challenge!  Here are the planes made by the panel – they only had 30 seconds!

I got to meet some of the other shortlisted artists as we sat nervously waiting – Andrew David Green, Jayne Stephen, Martin Herbert.

Congratulations to Pascal Anson who won, this will really showcase his work to an international audience.

I’m very proud to have been shortlisted to the final 10 but obviously a wee bit disappointed not to be the winner!  It was good experience and it’s all part of my mission to see my artwork on different contexts.

For the full British Airways press release click here.