If you have ever judged an art prize I have a piece of advice for you. Leave immediately after the awards ceremony before any irate artists can complain to you.

It’s a trick I learnt some time ago.

Having written on art for four decades I have judged a few prizes in my time. On the weekend, I judged the Nundah Village Art Show as I have these past few years. Nundah is quite close to us so it’s quite convenient to do this.

I once regarded Nundah as the end of the earth. A friend lived there in the 1990s before it was fashionable and we used to think he lived in an outer suburb. Now Nundah is almost considered the inner city. Go figure.

The Nundah Village Art Show Prize and judging is held at the local Mitsubishi dealership on Sandgate Road at Nundah and more power to them for clearing out a showroom to display the art.

I also happen to enjoy visiting motor dealerships so that helps.

When I’m handing out prizes at an art show or launching one as I sometimes do (in fact I also opened an exhibition on the weekend at the Royal Queensland Art Society’s gallery on Petrie Terrace), I often mention how ironic it is. Why? Because I’m the guy who came last in art in my senior year at Miami State High School.

It wasn’t an accident. Another bloke (his name was Peter but he was better known as The Gremlin) raced me to the bottom and I won, much to the disgust of the art mistress who sacked me from her art class after an exam.

We were supposed to spend a whole period doing a painting for this exam, but I finished mine in around two minutes.

I painted a swirl of colour and drew one of those old memes with the bloke with a big nose looking over a fence. It was usually referred to as “Foo was here” or “Kilroy was here”.

But actually, I called my painting God and the Universe.

It was my little joke, but the teacher didn’t think it was funny. She failed me and kicked me out of the class.

Which suited me just fine.

My punishment was that I had to spend every art period now in the school library which wasn’t a punishment at all. I enjoyed that and just spent the time reading whatever I was reading at the time … or browsing library books.

One day I found myself in the art book section and I came across an art history book that included a colour plate of a painting entitled Saturn Devouring His Son by the Spanish artist Francisco Goya. It’s monstrous and a bit terrifying and it made me think: “Hey, maybe art is interesting after all?”

Strange that it took getting kicked out of art to foster an interest in art.

And I have been interested ever since and have been writing about the arts – visual art in particular – my whole career.

Which is why they sometimes ask me to judge art prizes and open art exhibitions.

It’s only later that I mention my art results at school. So, keep it to yourself, will you?