Monte San Savino 2015 Bests

The Decennial of Monte San Savino (MSS 2015) was celebrated this weekend. What a blast! Once again, a wonderful orgy of great marvels with a huge level, extraordinary participation and tons of artworks to remember.

I will write more than just this post about this year's experience of course, but let's tackle first what you guys are probably most waiting for. Photos of the winner miniatures!

In Monte San Savino, because the level is so high, and since the format is Open, there are many many prizes. The participation is huge and the level cannot be compared to any other annual contest (in the Fantasy section at least). For this reason, there are many medals in each category, and it is not rare to see 4 golds in the same category (the number of silver and bronze medals per category could very well go over a dozen). In addition to this, there are different "Best of" awards. We find the Best of Fantasy and Best of Historical, which is more or less common to other contests, and also the Best of Painter and Best of Sculpting, together with Best of Legio (especial award from the Legio Pictorum forum).

Let's see the Bests of Monte San Savino 2015 (some of these are photos taken from my phone which of course could be much better, I'm sure there will be better ones when their owners take better pics):

Best of Show: Antonio Zapatero (sculpting) / Gustavo Gil (painting)

This tandem of spanish masters take home the most important award, the Best of Show, with a completely scratch built diorama modelled by Antonio and painted by Gustavo. It is not a new piece since we already saw it live in Euromilitaire and Soldat de Plom, but it is indeed a beautiful creation and a worthy winner of MSS 2015.

Best of Fantasy: Michael Kontraros (sculpting) / Kyriakos Simos (painting)

Another wonderful creation of the greek master Michael Kontraros, this time with Kyriakos Simos. The piece speaks for itself!

Best of Figure: Joaquin Palacios

Joaquin Palacios takes home the Best of Figure for his sculpture of this Paul Bonner creation (a very famous illustration).

Best of Legio: Ben Komets

Ben Komets also known as the most prolific fantasy painter of late, takes the best of Legio for his extraordinary representation entered in the contest.

But these are not the only bests you could find in the contest. I do not have photos of them (sadly, so many miniatures in the contest, I did not have the time nor the energy to take pics of them), but they still deserve mentioning:

Best of Historical: John Rosengrant

Best of Standard: Davide Rainone

There are also nearly 400 photos of miniatures, all from the Master categories in the Fantasy section, that I posted live on my Facebook during the event. Check them out in Volomir's Facebook. Also, find out my personal favourites and more opinions and information on MSS in the next few days. Stay tuned!