The football season may be on hold but that has not stopped one Stockport Academy student from scoring a hat-trick in a national football anti-racism competition. Head Girl Evie Griffiths won the Artwork and Creative Writing Award (Year 10+ category) for the third year running in the national Show Racism the Red Card Competition.
The prestigious competition tasks pupils to produce creative work with an original anti-racism theme. Entrants can produce work in a wide range of media including artwork, creative writing, film and music. Evie’s winning piece used subtle detail to get her message across, basing her artwork around the key words of the campaign, reflecting how the charity uses the high profile of football to tackle the issue of racism amongst young people.
Stockport Academy’s Principal Janine McCann said:
“Evie is an exceptional artist, and has achieved something incredible with her latest win in this competition. We are all so proud of her and she totally deserves this, having put in hours and hours of her own time to create a beautiful piece of art with such an important message behind it.”
Since winning the award, Evie has become the first ever winner of the Cyrille Regis Memorial Award. The former West Bromwich Albion player's widow Julia picked out Evie's design from all of the Show Racism The Red Card competition entries.
Julia Regis said:
"I like the messaging with ‘boot it out now’ using both words and imaging to convey the message. The creativity with the word ‘racism’ is most impressive - I can see different facial features, skin colours and the blood vessels that illustrates when we break it down - we are all the same. An insightful piece of art."
Manchester United Legend Bryan Robson, who was friends with Cyrille, added:
"I would like to congratulate Evie on winning the Cyrille Regis memorial award with a great design, well done. Cyrille was a great player, a fantastic person and a true leader in the fight to stamp out racism."
Evie said:
“Winning in this category for the third year in a row was a real shock and a lovely surprise, and finding out I had also won the Cyrille Regis Memorial Award was a great boost in this strange period out of school.
“It means a great deal to me that my Artwork was chosen by Julia Regis, whose late husband did so much to fight racism throughout his amazing career, and I hope to stay involved with Show Racism The Red Card in some way after I leave Stockport Academy and move on to Sixth Form College. My friends and family were also impressed I’d received "well done" messages from both Chris Kamara and Bryan Robson!”
Show Racism The Red Card Chief Executive Ged Grebby said:
"Cyrille Regis was a legend of the game and someone who played a leading role in the anti-racism movement in the UK. The memorial award is one of the ways we remember Cyrille's contribution and his legacy. We are planning on printing 20,000 calendars and they are always one of Show Racism The Red Card's most popular resources. Well done to Stockport Academy and Evie on her third win in a row."