design competition

I was taking part in a drawing and design competition. The event was held in a large hall, housing hundreds, maybe thousands of people, and I was sitting up the back on the right hand side. There was a stage up the front and everything was high-tech including screens magnifying the people on stage, video links to other parts of the world, a great sound system playing contemporary electronic music and more. A compare held up various items of clothing: a bodice, a skirt, a scarf, shoes and a handbag. They were all silver. She read out a script that outlined the rules of the competition and detailed the countries participating. The idea was to produce a magnificent clothing design, complete with hand-drawn model, incorporating the various items of clothing but completely unique. I knew what I wanted to draw and was ready with my pencils and paper. As soon as we were allowed, I chose a pencil and began to draw, but immediately my confidence began to falter. I was not convinced that I had chosen the correct pencil, and tried several more. The leads began to break, I sketched the model too low on the page, I couldn’t find an eraser—things began to go wrong and time was ticking by. I needed to find a clean sheet of paper and a sharp pencil, and I began to sort through trucks of my old belongings that appeared beside me. Everything was messy and dark. I put my hand into bags and, instead of art tools, I found fillets of meat: chicken, beef and lamb. I did not think the meat was mine but I knew that it needed to be refrigerated, so I packed it into bags and put it in a fridge near the stage. People were beginning to put their pencils down and I hadn’t even started my artwork. I knew that if I could just finish it, I would be in the running for the prize.