TFOB/FWA's Aline Goodman's Young Artist Awards held March 4, 2023

For the 11th year in a row, Friends of Western Art sponsored the Tucson Festival of Books’ Young Artist Competition. This contest is open to students across Southern Arizona in preschool through high school.

The FWA Board is pleased to announce that we have renamed this competition the “Aline Goodman Young Artist Awards”. FWA Director Emeritus Aline Goodman passed away in January 2021. She was a founding member of FWA 40 years ago and was a Board Member and Secretary of our organization for many of those years.

Besides being an accomplished artist, Aline was a passionate advocate of Western Art and a true friend to many Western artists. She was also a supporter of young artists developing their skills and expressing themselves in Western themes. We think adding her name to our Annual Young Artist Awards is an appropriate way to honor her memory.

On March 4th, 2023, twenty-four finalists (entries are featured in poster photos below) will be recognized at the Book Festival’s special awards presentation, featuring former Arizona Daily Star’s Editorial Cartoonist David Fitzsimmons with introduction by TFOB co-founder Brenda Viner. In addition, all Young Artist contest winners will be awarded a $100 art supply gift card, a commemorative poster, and the Young Authors and Young Artists Anthology of Winners.

The Tucson Festival of Books celebrates books and literacy at the fourth-largest book festival in the country. This two-day event features more than 300 presentations, 200 exhibitors, and countless opportunities to meet authors, poets, screenwriters, and journalists. Once again, the 2023 Festival featured book signings, panel discussions, staged entertainment, food vendors, children’s and Science City programming, and dozens of free activities for all ages on the University of Arizona Mall.