Gravette School District is thrilled to showcase the inaugural Year 1 Grand Prize Winners and People's Choice Award recipient for our district-wide student photography contest. Throughout our inaugural year, middle and high school students in grades 6 through 12 picked up cameras, explored various visual themes, and shared their unique perspectives with our entire community.
We are proud of every student who threw their hat into the ring this past year. We hope all participants continue to experiment with their photography, sharpen their creative skills, and capture the world around them.
We also want to extend our sincere gratitude to Wingard Photography for generously sponsoring the Annual Grand Prize awards. By supporting our young artists and recognizing their outstanding work, Wingard Photography is directly investing in the growth and creative future of our students.
Grand Finale Judging Process & Criteria
To determine our top overall winners from Year 1, qualified 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place entries from all four seasonal contest cycles were pooled together for a head-to-head final evaluation. Judges evaluated entries flat across the board using three core criteria:
Composition and Technical Execution: Focus, lighting, framing, and overall effort in photographic technique.
Adherence to Prompt: How clearly and creatively the photo represented its seasonal category.
Community and School Spirit: How authentically the image reflected school life, local culture, or community connection.
The Student Opportunity Rule: To ensure fair recognition across the district, a single-student limit was applied during final scoring. If a student had multiple photos qualify for top standing across the year, only their single highest-scoring photo remained in the final pool. Secondary qualifying photos were removed to give other talented participants an opportunity to earn top honors.
The People’s Choice Award: The People’s Choice Award offered a second chance for every runner-up entry from all four seasonal cycles. The single photograph that accumulated the highest overall public vote total across the district earned this distinct recognition.
Year 1 Grand Champions
1st Place Grand Prize
Henry Chernota (8th Grade) — March + April 2026 (Black & White)
This winning black-and-white photograph shows a young girl walking down a quiet country road surrounded by trees, with her back turned toward the camera as the road curves ahead of her. The black-and-white effect works especially well here, helping the contrast between the road, trees, and subject stand out clearly without the distraction of color. With the subject placed smaller in the frame, the photograph captures both the feeling of the landscape and the sense of a journey ahead, creating a calm and thoughtful image for the Black and White category.
2nd Place Grand Prize
Jayden Allen (10th Grade) — September + October 2025 (Student Life)
This shot captures pure, unscripted joy and camaraderie. Wearing their Gravette Lions jerseys, the students clasp hands high in victory with wide, exuberant grins. Shot from a dynamic low angle, the composition frames both the high-energy celebration up front and the laughing classmates below, focusing every detail on authentic school spirit and connection.
3rd Place Grand Prize
Sydnee Edwards (8th Grade) — Nov + Dec 2025 (Shapes)
This first-place photograph from Nov+Dec captures the moon on November 5, during a rare and striking lunar phase when it appeared unusually large and warmly colored in the night sky. Centered prominently in the frame, the moon becomes a study in pure form, a nearly perfect sphere suspended in darkness. Subtle surface details are visible along its edges and across its face, revealing ridges and depressions that give texture and depth to an object often perceived as flat or distant.
What makes this image exceptional is how it reimagines scale. The moon feels monumental, yet it occupies only a small portion of the frame, surrounded by stars (added in during editing) that emphasize both its proximity and its vast context within space. The balance of light allows the moon to remain detailed without overwhelming the surrounding sky, preserving both subject and setting. This photograph fits the Shapes prompt beautifully by transforming a familiar celestial object into something both intimate and awe-inspiring, highlighting the quiet wonder of our closest neighbor in space.
People’s Choice Award
Lukas Easley (8th Grade) — March + April 2026 (Black & White)
This black-and-white photograph captures a horse in profile, with light detail visible in its coat, mane, and face. The use of black and white helps emphasize texture and contrast throughout the image, while the softly blurred background keeps the focus on the horse itself. The calm expression and clear detail create a simple but very effective image for the Black and White category.
Year 1 People’s Choice Awards Runner-Ups
In addition to our overall Grand Champions, we want to give special recognition to the top public vote-winners across each individual contest cycle. The People’s Choice voting gave our entire community a voice in celebrating student talent. Because our overall People's Choice Grand Prize winner came from the March + April round, the section below highlights the standout entries that earned the highest overall vote totals in our previous cycles.
Sep + Oct 2025: Sunset — Sydnee Edwards (8th Grade)
This glowing landscape photograph captures a radiant sunset beaming directly over a large, weather-worn rock atop a grassy hill overlooking a scenic, wooded horizon. The low-angled sun creates a striking starburst effect, scattering warm golden light across the wispy clouds and casting a luminous halo over the surrounding treetops. A subtle, colorful lens flare rests at the base of the central boulder, bringing atmospheric warmth and depth to the rustic scene.
Rather than focusing solely on the colorful sky, this photo uses the distinct golden-hour light of sunset to completely transform the landscape below. The dramatic sunburst, soft backlighting, and rich golden tones capture the quiet warmth and changing atmosphere that define the end of the day.
Nov + Dec 2025: Architecture — Cadence Hanson (7th Grade)
This nighttime photograph captures a courthouse illuminated from below, its classical arches and multi-level façade standing out dramatically against the dark sky. Shot from ground level, the upward perspective emphasizes scale and grandeur, while shadows add depth and texture to the building’s smooth exterior surface. The absence of visible grout lines gives the structure a solid, monumental presence, reinforcing its sense of permanence and authority.
Choosing to photograph the building at night was a deliberate and effective decision that highlights the structural geometry of the design. The artificial lighting and deep shadows accentuate the arches, symmetry, and scale, showcasing how light interacts with structural design to transform standard brick and stone into a dramatic architectural statement.
Jan + Feb 2026: Animals — Bryor Bohannon (9th Grade)
This close-up portrait focuses on a calm bovine face highlighted by a warm, natural glow from the sun. Every element of the animal’s features is presented with remarkable clarity and detail. The composition places the subject slightly off-center within a portrait frame, while a softly blurred background removes distractions and brings immediate closeness to the scene.
This photo wins the category by capturing personality rather than just a distance shot of livestock. The shallow depth of field and relaxed expression demonstrate patience and trust between the photographer and subject, resulting in a serene, high-detail animal portrait that feels grounded and full of character.
Special Thank You
Thank you to all of the students who participated throughout the inaugural year of our photography contest. Your submissions highlighted the time, thought, and creativity you put into seeing the world through your own perspective. Each photo reflected a unique way of noticing details, capturing moments, and telling a story through an image. We appreciate your willingness to share your work with our schools and community.
We also want to thank the teachers and staff who made this contest possible through their encouragement, support, and coordination behind the scenes. Finally, we are deeply grateful to Wingard Photography for sponsoring our Year 1 Grand Prizes and supporting student creativity. Their partnership provides meaningful recognition for our student photographers and encourages them to keep learning, practicing, and creating.