Listen Now: 
A young mother who went back to school to pursue her dream of becoming an artist has won a major prize.
Tira Walsh from Tainui won the Kaipara Wallace Arts Trust Award in this year's Wallace Arts Awards, which gives her a three month residency in Switzerland.
She came from Tauranga 20 years ago to study at Auckland Institute of Technology, but broke off her art studies to raise four children before going back to complete a Master of Fine Art at Unitec last year.
She had her first solo show in Auckland's Two Rooms Gallery in July.
"I'm doing the business. I'm being a mum and then when I get into the studio I love the fact I have another environment to work with and I can be free, I can take chances, I can be vigorous, I can be rugged. It's a different thing to my home environment," Walsh says.
The Paramount Award was won by Robert Jahnke from Ngati porou.
!["p_facebook"]("/site/uma/images/story_img/facebook.jpg")
& !["p_twitter"]("/site/uma/images/story_img/twitter.jpg")
Copyright © 2019, UMA Broadcasting Ltd: www.waateanews.com
RELATED NEWS
