THE accolades keep coming for talented Meadow Flat teen Will Hazzard.
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The latest is the announcement that he is one of four finalists – the others are all in their 20s, while Will is just 16 – for the Arts and Fashion Award in the NSW/ACT Young Achiever Awards.
That means the young artist will be off to the awards gala dinner in April in Sydney, where the winners will be announced in front of what is expected to be a sizeable crowd.
“A couple of weeks ago, an email came through that he was in the semi-finals,” Will’s mother Kelly said.
“I thought that was pretty good. I said to William, ‘you probably won't get past that, but it shows you how the process works’.”
And then came the news that Will had advanced to the finals.
“The judges were very, very taken with him in particular and his work - who he was,” Mrs Hazzard said.
“As a person, he is very, very good. He is the best human being I know.”
Will, who studies at home through the Dubbo School of Distance Education, is inspired in his painting by the many animals around his home, though a recent work is a striking, dramatic self-portrait.
“He has always been a tactile child,” his mother said. “The texture [of his works] is incredible to feel.”
Will, a regular entrant in local shows, has had his work exposed to a much wider audience in recent times.
He has a work in the A Feast of Artists exhibition at Charles Sturt University Dubbo campus, and will have a solo exhibition at the campus to follow.
He also scored a real coup last year when his lizard artwork was chosen by the NSW Department of Education to feature on T-shirts and promotional materials for a series of music festivals.
Mrs Hazzard said it was an incredible experience to see her son’s art on T-shirts worn by a sea of thousands of students.
He was also named as the Bathurst Arts Council 2BS Youth Arts Award winner during Bathurst’s Australia Day celebrations last month.
Will, who is on the autism spectrum, says painting, which he has been doing since he was young, makes him feel “happy, calm, relaxed”.
“We always used to say that where there’s a Will, there’s a way,” his mother said.
