Despite there being no Junior Kadooment this year, several young designers were able to display their talents in the Oye Kids Charity’s Costume Design Competition which has been described as a success.
Their creations were put on display and celebrated on Sunday evening at the awards ceremony for winners of the contest.
Chairman of Oye Kids Charity Adebola Oni told Barbados TODAY she and board member Kimberley Emtage wanted to push ahead with the competition, especially with the COVID-19 pandemic forcing the cancellation of several events.
“We wanted to create a design competition for children to come up with an individual [design] for our [Junior] Kadooment band, the Lend A Hand Kadooment Band, but there is no Kadooment in the form that we expected so we [had to make] the decision of if we should cancel the competition or continue with it, and we decided to continue it because COVID has cancelled too many of our plans,” Oni explained.
The competition allowed individuals under 18 to show their artistic ability through costume design and fine art, and encouraged young people to celebrate Barbadian culture.
Competitors were required to create a Junior Kadooment costume design based on the following themes: Environmental Awareness, Water, Water Everywhere, HIV Awareness, and Pandemic Pandemonium. The first prize winner was Remarco Griffith, Gabriel Worrell was second, and the third prize went to Hassani Greaves.
Oni said the competition was a huge success among the little ones.
“It’s been difficult because people have no jump-up that you can see but the children really enjoyed making the designs and we got a lot of good designs and we will use them in the band because that was the intention of the competition. We always have children working in the band making the costumes and decorating so we really want to continue with that where they now design parts of the band, and that was our whole aim,” she added.
OYE Kids was founded in 2014 and evolved into a charity based on creativity, literacy, education, and innovation. (MR)