I’ve suddenly developed an interest in the Maxwell and Merle Carroll Silver Collection at the Arts Centre in Melbourne. This link explains some of the pieces, and at the end mentions augmenting the collection with the acquisitive prize. The previous link shows an image of some pieces, presumably from the collection.
I thought the award had been going on for longer than that (the article states it began in ’07), but having moved to Melbourne in 2007, and having first visited Buda during the Silver Exhibition that same year, I just assumed that the format it had that year was the way it had always been.
So there isn’t a vast vault of recent silversmithing acquisitions in the Arts Centre that we’re not seeing. Not just yet. Though there is a large collection of Max and Merle’s trinkets. Must be worth a look?