The winter months can be a good time to think about creating an item for the Freedonia Marxonia art contest! The annual Freedonia Marxonia festival will be held in October 2020 at The State University of New York at Fredonia.

The art contest is intended as a fun activity to acknowledge the Marx Brothers and their connection to Fredonia. Using any medium (including items found around the house or in nature), creative renditions of one or more of the Marx Brothers are welcome. Community members and students of all ages and skill levels are invited to participate. Artwork can be realistic, stylized, caricatured, etc. It can be drawn, painted, sculpted, constructed, or formed in any original way.

The Marx Brothers were comedic stars of vaudeville, Broadway, movies, radio, and television in the first part of the 20th century. Their 1933 movie Duck Soup is set in the fictional country of “Freedonia.” In 1987, Fredonia students created Freedonia Marxonia: Marx Brothers Film Festival and Symposium to commemorate this connection.

Entries will be displayed as part of the Freedonia Marxonia exhibit in the University’s Reed Library. Entries will also be eligible for monetary prizes: $100 first prize, $75 second prize, $50 third prize. The exhibit will run from Oct.1 through Oct. 18. Artwork is due by Sept. 28. Submit to Cindy Yochym in Reed Library. For more information, contact Cindy at Cynthia.Yochym@fredonia.edu or 673-4966, or visit the Freedonia Marxonia website fredonia.libguides.com/marxonia.

Freedonia Marxonia is supported through the Hahn Family Freedonia Marxonia Fund of the Fredonia College Foundation.