People were lining up outside the gallery from 8.30am, with submissions accepted between 10.30am and 4.30pm.
The review is open to people as young as 12, with artists of all ages taking part.
Toy said her favourite submissions were those from first-time entrants.
"They can be a bit older, but often this is the first time they've put themselves out there like that," she said.
Artist David Traub has been living in Whanganui since 1995. He was born in America and lived in England before moving to teach glassmaking at UCOL Whanganui.
He has entered the review every year since 1996 and this year has entered a 90cm tall glass cube.
Traub said he liked glassworking so much as the material used to make it was very basic, but everyone approached it differently.
"I've been making and teaching glass for 50 years, and I've never seen anybody do the same thing with it, yet the materials are very basic and the processes are not really different.
"To blow glass today, it's pretty much the same [technique] as it was when Jesus was born, the only difference is the materials used to heat the kiln are better, that's pretty much it," he said.
Gallery preparator Jamie Ross said it was his first year working with the gallery and handling submissions.
The first couple of hours of submissions had been pretty busy, but he had been looking forward to the day to see the work submitted.
"Just the variety of works coming in, not knowing what's going to turn up, there's some talent out there," he said.
Ross is also an artist and submitted his sculpture, three giant wood and fabric mushrooms with USB speakers hidden inside the hoods of the mushrooms, for the review.
He had been sculpting as a hobby for about 20 years.
"I've always been a maker, always doing stuff, my initial thing was that I wanted to make a puppet," he said.
A builder by trade, Ross met a carver after moving to Whanganui who taught him the finer arts of sculpting.
"He's the one who properly got me into working with chisels and gouges rather than power tools."
He liked sculpting as an act of wordless self-expression.
"It's just an expression, isn't it? Without using words, it's just like another language.
"I think everybody should be making something; instead of zoning out maybe we should be zoning in a little."
Entrants will be notified of their selection for the review exhibition and the awards on November 7, with the awards night on November 11. The exhibition starts at Sarjeant on the Quay from November 12 and closes on February 26.
