A total of 145 entries were submitted to this year’s prize, up on last year’s 90 entries, which BAMM director Vivien Clyne said is fantastic.

“It’s really great,” she said.

“We’ve had so much support from schools; we have a really strong group from the under 18s and under 12s sections.”

The exhibition has been set up at BAMM and Ms Clyne said it’s looking good, with plenty of high quality works on display.

“It looks so colourful and bright,” she said.

“Some have lots of little details; it’s really cool how people have used detail to bring out the person’s personality.”

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A mix of local and regional artists have entered this year’s competition, which is open to all ages and artworks in all media.

“It’s nice to have a few different artists as well as familiar people who entered,” Ms Clyne said.

“There are quite a few portraits which were created from the portrait workshops we held in July.

“There’s also a lot of people I didn’t realise were artistic.”

The 2018 exhibition is being judged by last year’s grand prize winner, Brenda Runnegar, a professional artist living and working in Canberra.

Ms Runnegar will be in Moree to judge on Thursday before attending Friday’s opening to present the prizes to the winning artists.

Ms Clyne encourages all the artists and their families, as well as members of the public, to come along to the opening at 6pm on Friday.

The Moree Portrait Prize will run from Friday, November 23 until Saturday, December 22, with a People’s Choice vote running until December 20.

Cash prizes: