Competition for a painting featuring one of the many registered Historic Vessels to be found in ports and harbours around the UK. Watch a promotional video here.
This competition, resulting from a partnership between the Royal Society of Marine Artists, the Wapping Group of Artists, and National Historic Ships UK, looks for work depicting and celebrating vessels on the National Register of Historic Vessels. There are some 2000 vessels on the Register, ranging from large ships to canal boats, in locations to be found all over the United Kingdom.
The competition is for a work recording your engagement as an artist with one of these historic vessels. You are encouraged to visit a site yourself in order to sketch, paint, photograph, talk to those at work and absorb the significance of the particular vessel. The judges will be looking for some indication that you have done this.
You may search the Registers here. You can use the filters on the right to narrow your search by location, and for a selection of vessels filtered by different zones, see below:
If you inform us of a vessel you wish to engage with, we will do our best to put you in contact with the custodian. You may also consult a list of events where registered vessels may be present here, and you can keep up with any newly announced events on our dedicated page.
You may use any medium except digitally manipulated photographs (if you are interested in this option, National Historic Ships UK host a yearly Photography Competition). If submitting prints, these should be traditionally hand-worked, i.e. not digital (giclee) reproductions.
REPRODUCTION RIGHTS AND COPYRIGHT
For each work you enter in the Competition you will be asked to grant the RSMA and NHS-UK a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free license to use for two years, and publicly display your work solely in connection with the Competition or linked promotional material including RSMA and NHS-UK websites and without any further notice or remuneration to you. Your entry asks you to provide your name in the format you wish to be used in any acknowledgements.
If your work is selected, we reserve the right to reproduce it for commercial purposes including, but not limited to, calendars, promotional flyers and on social media, by doing so you agree to give the RSMA and NHS-UK a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty free licence to use, copy, modify, translate and / or adapt, distribute and publicly display your work.
*The prizes must be taken as stated and cannot be deferred. There will be no cash alternatives to the prizes. Any prize remaining unclaimed six months after the closing date of the Competition will be declared void.
GOVERNING LAW
Valid wherever legal, the rules of this competition are subject to English law and the parties to any dispute or action shall submit to the exclusive jurisdiction of the English courts.
