Hi Marji,
We have a similar Visual Arts scholarship and have struggled to effectively promote it over the last few years. It usually ends up going to a current student, which in our case is ok, but even those applications have been thin on the ground in the last couple of years.
Usually, the best way to promote things like this is to ask the department staff to target students via people they know but even this hasn’t worked.
I like the idea of a competition, I’ll be interested to see how you go.
Sorry this isn’t helpful, I just wanted to let you know that you weren’t the only ones!
A bit of solidarity never goes astray.
Hope you have a great 2024.
Best, Nicole