tag:theconversation.com,2011:/us/topics/art-prizes-11640/articles
Art prizes – The Conversation
2019-12-10T02:41:02Z
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/128461
2019-12-10T02:41:02Z
2019-12-10T02:41:02Z
(Almost) everyone’s a winner? Art is meant to break rules and prizes must adapt
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/305794/original/file-20191209-90580-1xhreww.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">British artists (L-R) Oscar Murillo, Lawrence Abu Hamdan, Helen Cammock and Tai Shani celebrate after being announced as the joint winners of Turner Prize 2019.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source"> Vickie Flores/EPA</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Last week Britain’s Turner Prize for visual art was <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2019/dec/03/turner-prize-2019-lawrence-abu-hamdan-helen-cammock-oscar-murillo-and-tai-shani-shared">announced</a>. For the first time, the award went to a collective instead of the usual singular winner. The four finalists – Helen Cammock, Oscar Murillo, Tai Shani and Lawrence Abu Hamden – came together “to make a statement in the name of commonality, multiplicity and solidarity – in art as in society”. The judges agreed and the single prize was shared. </p>
<p>There were, of course, negative <a href="https://news.artnet.com/art-world/art-world-reacts-to-turner-prize-2019-1721598">responses</a>. Tenuous links were made to joint <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/oct/14/booker-prize-judges-break-the-rules-and-insist-on-joint-winners">Booker</a> prize winners and even those who had <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/dec/02/bad-sex-award-twosome-prize-goes-to-didier-decoin-and-john-harvey">shared</a> the dubious bad sex writing gong. </p>
<p>While there has been outcry – the usual media and social hyperbole about the artists changing the rules, creating themselves as multiple winners, and making everyone a winner – art is meant to break rules. And prizes must adapt.</p>
<h2>Walking the walk</h2>
<p>This hasn’t happened before. But why is that a shock? We’re talk about contemporary art, after all. To recast the late Robert Hughes’ <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/542639.The_Shock_of_the_New">book</a> title, the “shock of the new” continues in art, even if it’s a very, very, mild shock in this case.</p>
<p>The important issue in this win is the nature of the four artists’ work chosen for the final show. All four are working in and around similar themes of societal exclusion. The critical point is that their mutual decision is very much in line with their practices. It is a strengthening of their voices and truth. This can only be a good thing for their art, its reception and just as importantly, for other artists that work in similar ways.</p>
<p>While the joint Turner Prize was about the collective action of the finalists, the Booker judges’ decision was about not, by necessity, making the invidious call between two deserving candidates. Neither of these decisions were about an “everyone is a winner” mentality.</p>
<p>There are of course inherent flaws in any prize situation. Judges need to be discriminating and this can be either positive or negative, or even both.</p>
<p>I have been part of this process, as both a contestant and a judge. I have been on the judging panel for the Blake, Clancy and Strathfield art prizes. Both sides of a prize need to be taken with a grain of salt. </p>
<h2>Being judged</h2>
<p>As an artist, there is something to be said for being in most prize exhibitions and I do hope to be at least a finalist again. The prizes are in some ways a reality check about what I am making as an artist. </p>
<p>Artmaking for me is about constant doubt. Is this the best of what I am doing? Will anyone else get it (yet)? </p>
<p>Selection as a finalist is a recognition by judges that people are finding their own voice, tenacity and truth. For an artist the exhibition is a confidence builder against this necessary doubt. </p>
<p>As a judge, you can see that conviction in the works. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1202016099367342080"}"></div></p>
<p>There are also the simply pragmatic questions for artists about putting a work into competitions. Who is judging? What will it cost to prepare and transport the work? Is it worth it? (On the cost issue I do have a related question about competitions charging entry fees for artists and then charging the audience.)</p>
<h2>Judging</h2>
<p>On the other side of the equation are the judges and what direction the judging panel may take. As the judge of art prizes, I’ve witnessed intense and focussed deliberations but also vividly recall one instance when a fellow judge got very hot-headed and upset about the course of events.</p>
<p>That heat seemed mostly to be about self-righteousness and less about the openness needed to take on the new and unexplored in art.</p>
<p>Are prizes are relevant? If you win, yes, you bet! It isn’t just about the money, but that money can be a really good leg up for many artists on low incomes. My first car came from prize money and it made moving art materials around a whole lot easier. </p>
<p>Prizes are about recognition that goes beyond 15 minutes of fame. Prizes also present the important question of where to go next.</p>
<p>Ultimately, this year’s Turner Prize helps keep contemporary art and practice in the public domain and sparks engagement. Liking or dismissing the artworks or the judging are all possible but wrestling with the work is so much better.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1201998935826546690"}"></div></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/128461/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Lachlan Warner does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Why are we so surprised that artists are also demanding changes to the way prizes are awarded?
Lachlan Warner, Australian Catholic University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/81326
2017-07-23T20:08:16Z
2017-07-23T20:08:16Z
Politics of landscape: the 2017 Wynne Prize finalists
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179127/original/file-20170721-24021-1x2x9mu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Wynne Prize 2017 finalist James Drinkwater, 'Passage to Rungli Rungliot', oil on hardboard, 180x360cm</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">© the artist Photo: Felicity Jenkins, AGNSW</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The <a href="https://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/prizes/wynne/">Wynne Prize</a> is bestowed upon the best landscape painting of Australian scenery or best figure sculpture. This year, over a third of the finalists - 15 out of 42 - are Indigenous artists, and 11 are from the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara (APY) lands in central Australia. </p>
<p>In fact there is an entire room dedicated to Aboriginal landscape paintings. It is unusual to have such a large portion of the Wynne dedicated to these works, and disorienting to discover them separated from the rest of the exhibition. Presenting these works on their own draws attention to the difference of Indigenous art within the wider Australian art sphere rather than integrating it.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179128/original/file-20170721-23983-1ge3ln5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179128/original/file-20170721-23983-1ge3ln5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179128/original/file-20170721-23983-1ge3ln5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=798&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179128/original/file-20170721-23983-1ge3ln5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=798&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179128/original/file-20170721-23983-1ge3ln5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=798&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179128/original/file-20170721-23983-1ge3ln5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1003&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179128/original/file-20170721-23983-1ge3ln5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1003&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179128/original/file-20170721-23983-1ge3ln5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1003&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Wynne Prize 2017 finalist.
Angus Nivison, ‘Pernicious’, acrylic spray-paint and charcoal on paper, 205 x 154.5 cm</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">© the artist Photo: Felicity Jenkins, AGNSW</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In the forecourt, a simultaneous exhibition, installed only this week, includes more works by APY Lands Art Centre artists. They were selected from the gallery’s permanent collection, and may have been pulled out to complement the Trustees’ selection for the Wynne. This is heartening, and no doubt heartfelt, but focusing on increasing the representation of a marginalised group can result in a compromise of the standard of works selected.</p>
<p>Overall, this year’s Wynne prize standard is as haphazard as previous years. This is perhaps partly the result of the Trustees behaving like curators, rather than prize selectors. Choosing a large number of finalists from the same remote region may have seemed like a means of strengthening the visual experience for visitors, whilst also complementing the showcasing of their permanent collection, but hanging them together creates a sense of tokenism. </p>
<p>Luckily, a truly alluring work diverts my attention from pondering these issues. It is a <a href="https://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/prizes/wynne/2017/29900/">Nyapanyapa Yunupingu</a> landscape, hung in an unassuming position, just outside the main room of Indigenous finalists. Yunupingu’s artworks are synaesthetic rather than only awakening a single sense. They sing and shudder.</p>
<p>The paint leaps from the bark and confounds my vision with images of other wildlife. The white forms, which are either wildflowers, humans or other vertebrate creatures are all of those species at once, as they dance across the dirt. Spend a little time in front of her painting and the gallery starts to melt away and be replaced by cicadas, a breeze rushing through spinifex grass and the distant sound of people murmuring.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179121/original/file-20170721-6436-vqh7b5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179121/original/file-20170721-6436-vqh7b5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179121/original/file-20170721-6436-vqh7b5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=268&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179121/original/file-20170721-6436-vqh7b5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=268&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179121/original/file-20170721-6436-vqh7b5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=268&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179121/original/file-20170721-6436-vqh7b5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=336&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179121/original/file-20170721-6436-vqh7b5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=336&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179121/original/file-20170721-6436-vqh7b5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=336&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Wynne Prize 2017 finalist.
Nyapanyapa Yunupingu,‘Landscape’
natural earth pigments on bark, 78x193cm</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">© the artist
Photo:Jenni Carter, AGNSW</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The other stand-out work, and my pick for the most deserved finalist entry, is <a href="https://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/prizes/wynne/2017/29871/">Juz Kitson</a>’s poetically titled sculpture “That which provides safety and the possibility of growth, that which you can put your trust in”.</p>
<p>Testicle, bladder, labia, intestine or foetus? Kitson’s assemblage of fur, seed and porcelain shapes creates a sexualized and fetishistic object of worship. Think of a Game of Thrones cloak. Think of a death pyre of antlers. Think Haitian Voodoo ceremony. Think of a giant clitoris. Kitson’s work has all of these elements. </p>
<p>It sits outside human time and has the character of something that could have existed before human life and afterwards too. I couldn’t contain my curiosity about what materials Kitson used and so I messaged her on Facebook. The swift answer: Jingdezhen porcelain and Southern ice porcelain/terracotta clay along with paraffin wax, resin, polyester thread, merino wool, fox and rabbit pelt, Tibetan gazelle horns, teeth, echidna quills and Bodhi seeds.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179123/original/file-20170721-1588-sz5l36.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179123/original/file-20170721-1588-sz5l36.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179123/original/file-20170721-1588-sz5l36.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=812&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179123/original/file-20170721-1588-sz5l36.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=812&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179123/original/file-20170721-1588-sz5l36.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=812&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179123/original/file-20170721-1588-sz5l36.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1020&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179123/original/file-20170721-1588-sz5l36.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1020&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179123/original/file-20170721-1588-sz5l36.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1020&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Wynne Prize 2017 finalist Juz Kitson ‘That which provides safety and the possibility of growth, that which you can put your trust in’,
Jingdezhen porcelain, Southern Ice porcelain, terracotta clay, paraffin wax, resin, silk thread, merino wool, fox and rabbit pelt, Tibetan gazelle horns, teeth, echidna quills, bodhi seeds, marine ply and treated pine,
200 x 133 x 50 cm.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">© the artist
Photo: Mim Sterling, AGNSW</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>A second reason Kitson’s work stands out for me is a political one: climate change. During an epoch of climate fear, and as we endure a lack of environmental leadership in Australia, there are many artists working to mediate these issues via their work. Art is a litmus test for public opinion and can be an effective way to disseminate important political ideas. </p>
<p>These ideas are mostly absent from the work of this year’s Wynne Prize finalists. Only Kitson’s brings to mind the concept of extinction, via the mass of horns, and nature’s deathly drive, through the overall image of a relic or artefact. Her work represents the remains of the human and the animal. It is futuristic, dark and a looming memorial for extinct species, one of which may be “the human” in years to come.</p>
<h2>Views of Australia</h2>
<p>There are some robust scenes of the Australian landscape in the finalist line-up. For instance, <a href="https://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/prizes/wynne/2017/29893/">John R Walker</a>, <a href="https://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/prizes/wynne/2017/29867/">Nicholas Harding</a>, <a href="https://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/prizes/wynne/2017/29884/">Angus Nivison</a>, <a href="https://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/prizes/wynne/2017/29864/">James Drinkwater</a>, <a href="https://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/prizes/wynne/2017/29898/">Joshua Yeldham</a> and <a href="https://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/prizes/wynne/2017/29897/">Philip Wolfhagen</a> all have highly competent and technically proficient paintings of conventional bushland scenery. </p>
<p>Several of these paintings draw upon classical compositions where the scene is framed by trees or picturesquely arranged around a “hero tree”. Or they comprise a composition where the view penetrates through recalcitrant scrub land. These are mostly patriarchal conventions of traditional landscape painting, which is a reminder of the prevailing <a href="https://theconversation.com/congratulations-natasha-bieniek-but-the-wynne-prize-is-deeply-flawed-44763">gender bias of previous Wynne prize exhibitions</a>.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179124/original/file-20170721-15106-1eyo2wk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179124/original/file-20170721-15106-1eyo2wk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179124/original/file-20170721-15106-1eyo2wk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179124/original/file-20170721-15106-1eyo2wk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179124/original/file-20170721-15106-1eyo2wk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179124/original/file-20170721-15106-1eyo2wk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179124/original/file-20170721-15106-1eyo2wk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179124/original/file-20170721-15106-1eyo2wk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Wynne Prize 2017 finalist Nicholas Harding, ‘Wilpena eucalypt and wattle’, oil on linen, 183x245cm.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">© the artist
Photo: Mim Stirling, AGNSW</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Kitson and Yunupingu, conversely, do not rely on traditional conventions of landscape painting. They open a door to a deeper experience of the material world, to that particular matter of being. Somehow, they make physical the spiritual, they make seeing a more multi-sensual experience, and so they change our perception of the natural world.</p>
<p>Jux Kitson’s work also has an enormous amount of working labour, discretely visible in each and every carefully formed and cast porcelain part. It heralds a strong political point about the epoch of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/an-official-welcome-to-the-anthropocene-epoch-but-who-gets-to-decide-its-here-57113">Anthropocene</a> and the damage we have caused to the land. </p>
<p>Likewise, whilst in the gallery space, I was constantly drawn back to Yunupingu’s landscape. There, modest and silent, the bark painting calls me, in a personal way, into a desert scene where women walk across the sand dunes, and talk together for hours. It sends me into a spin of delirium, into a vortex to where there is a real experience of lakeside flowers, where I can hear the mourning groans of the land.</p>
<p>However, based on past experience, I suspect neither of these two powerful artists will win. Instead I contend that one of the brightly coloured APY Indigenous works, all hung together in the high-ceiling gallery space, will win the day. </p>
<p>They are big and bright and colourful. Whilst it is crucial that Indigenous art gains greater momentum in the ongoing accumulation of landscape imagery in Australia, it is also important to select artworks carefully for inclusion in the Wynne Prize exhibition and not to mistake politics for aesthetic value.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/81326/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Prudence Gibson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
The standard of the 2017 Wynne finalists is as haphazard as previous years, hampered by a sense of tokenism and conventional landscapes, but works by Napanyapa Yunupingu and Juz Kitson stand out.
Prudence Gibson, Art writer and Tutor, UNSW Sydney
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/70148
2016-12-08T13:40:46Z
2016-12-08T13:40:46Z
The Turner Prize may seem out of date, but it created the UK’s contemporary art scene
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/149261/original/image-20161208-31391-1qeze7j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Helen Marten © Tate</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The news that Helen Marten won the 2016 Turner Prize this week was met with great and well deserved acclaim. Established by a group called the Patrons of New Art in 1984 and now in its 32nd year, the Turner Prize is exactly one year older than the winning artist herself. </p>
<p>It was set up to encourage and promote a wider interest in contemporary art throughout the UK, which it certainly has achieved, but today commentary is frequently disparaging – it has been called “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/2016/nov/15/turner-prize-age-limit-over-50">boring</a>”, “<a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/art/3561401/The-Turner-Prize-2008-who-cares-who-wins.html">irrelevant</a>” and “<a href="https://theconversation.com/turner-shortlisted-artist-the-prize-machine-stifles-art-48454">lumbering</a>” in recent years.</p>
<p>As such, it was refreshing this year not only to encounter the breadth and ingenuity of Marten’s work but to hear, in her acceptance speech, of her <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2016/nov/18/hepworth-sculpture-prize-winner-helen-marten-share-30000-award">distaste for “hierarchical” art prizes</a> and her pledge to share the prize money with her fellow nominees. She revealed a sense of something progressive and pioneering.</p>
<p>I’m a practising artist, who was nominated for the prize in collaboration with my twin sister Jane in 1999. And like Helen Marten, we also had our first solo museum show at The Serpentine Gallery around the same time. We were nominated alongside fellow artists Tracey Emin, Steve McQueen and Steven Pippin. That year, the much acclaimed Oscar-winning director and video artist Steve McQueen won. This was a period in which the Turner attracted much less negativity in the press. So it’s interesting to reflect, 17 years on, on what kind of impact the prize has had on the wider British contemporary art scene.</p>
<h2>Turner copycats</h2>
<p>What is certain is that the prize has been very successful in its mission statement of promoting and widening access to contemporary art. The Turner is still considered by many to be the benchmark of success for artists both nationally and internationally. Its format has been copied, adopted, modified and embraced internationally – from the Vincent Award in Amsterdam and the Hugo Boss Prize in New York to the Duchamp Prize in Paris and the Abraaj Capital Art Prize in the UAE. </p>
<p>The prize continues to thrive and without its impact we might well have been facing an even more serious threat to the vision for the arts in education, which is currently struggling enough – as evidenced in the Department of Education’s adoption of the <a href="http://www.artsprofessional.co.uk/news/arts-teachers-confirm-dire-impact-ebacc-classroom">EBacc system</a>, whereby all creative subjects including GCSE Art are no longer seen as essential to the secondary school curriculum. Without the Turner, I believe there would have been a real possibility of an incurable challenge to the diversity and potential for the creative industries in the UK. </p>
<p>But following the Turner’s example, art prizes have blossomed in the UK in recent years. There’s the <a href="http://www.artesmundi.org/">International Artes Mundi Prize</a> in Cardiff, the <a href="http://www.hepworthwakefield.org/news/the-hepworth-wakefield-announces-the-four-shortlisted-artists-and-judging-panel-for-the-uk-s-first-prize-for-sculpture/">Hepworth Prize for Sculpture</a> in Wakefield, <a href="http://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/walker/johnmoores/">John Moores Painting Prize</a> in Liverpool and – open to all UK undergraduates – the <a href="http://www.balticmill.com/about/baltic-news/woon-foundation-prize-2016-call-for-entries">Woon Foundation Prize</a> in Newcastle.</p>
<h2>New awards</h2>
<p>Art prizes are everywhere, it would seem, but there are some that are now starting to shift away from the familiar hierarchical format of the Turner Prize in pioneering and timely new ways. </p>
<p>In March this year, The Freelands Foundation <a href="https://www.a-n.co.uk/news/new-100000-award-launched-for-women-artists">announced a new award worth £100,000</a> for women artists, who are still dismally underrepresented within the art world. The award is the first of its kind to challenge this hierarchy by supporting a regional arts organisation to present an exhibition alongside realising a significant new work by a mid-career female artist living and working in the UK.</p>
<p>And last month, BALTIC Centre of Contemporary Art, Gateshead – the first venue outside of London to host the Turner Prize in 2012 – launched its own <a href="https://news.artnet.com/art-world/baltic-new-emerging-artists-award-744944#.WCnvrc_3HwA.email">New Artists Award</a> to be given to four emerging artists. This will be the first UK award ever to be selected solely by artists. Each recipient will receive the same amount as the Turner Prize winner – £25,000 – to create a new work that will be exhibited at BALTIC for 13 weeks, along with a £5,000 fee.</p>
<p>The legacy of The Turner prize is to continually recalibrate, revise and transform conceptions of contemporary art. The UK art world has changed immeasurably since 1984 and it is now a global enterprise. Yet it is a powerful testament to the strength and resilience of the creative industries in the regions that we have as many contemporary art galleries, art museums, artist-led organisations and arts-based education and research projects in colleges and universities. </p>
<p>And this message is only getting stronger. At the opening of the new Tate Modern earlier this year, the introduction of the new <a href="http://www.tate.org.uk/visit/tate-modern/tate-exchange?gclid=CJrslMS35NACFW217QodI00NDw">Tate Exchange</a> initiative was announced, placing art education and access for all at the heart of the UK’s foremost public contemporary art museum – and creator of the Turner Prize.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/70148/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Louise Wilson is currently BALTIC artist trustee.
</span></em></p>
Helen Marten, this year’s winner, has revealed a sense of something progressive and pioneering.
Louise Wilson, Senior Lecturer in Fine Art, Northumbria University, Newcastle
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/52035
2015-12-09T16:00:00Z
2015-12-09T16:00:00Z
Turner Prize win must not restrict Assemble’s work to the zone of ‘art’
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105041/original/image-20151209-15564-6t1shv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C653%2C1746%2C1478&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">© Assemble</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>To help me take stock of Assemble’s Turner Prize win I revisited a <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03dsk4d">lecture</a> by 2003 Turner Prize winner Grayson Perry, delivered in Liverpool in 2013. In it, Grayson offers guidance for discerning the boundaries of contemporary art. These include: Is it in a gallery? Is it made by an artist? And the “themepark + suduko” test; does it shock and make us think?</p>
<p>These boundaries have been getting less and less obvious over recent decades, but it will still have surprised many that a group of young architects won the UK’s most prestigious prize in contemporary art – for a project refurbishing houses in Liverpool.</p>
<p>Assemble are a creative collective and the judges saw their work as sitting in a long tradition of <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2015/dec/07/urban-assemble-win-turner-prize-toxteth">collective art practice</a>. I’m not sure Grayson’s markers of contemporary art are satisfied here, but he offers reassurance that art is a “baggy idea”. </p>
<p>In the series of projects in <a href="http://www.granby4streetsclt.co.uk/blog/">Granby</a>, South Liverpool, that attracted the attention of the Turner Prize, Assemble worked with local people to redevelop the area in a way that was meaningful to them, using its existing buildings. Their client is Granby 4 Streets Community Land Trust. </p>
<p>Assemble became a major player in a successful urban regeneration project, in an area that had been left to decay for a generation. Initiatives which might have seen these streets re-invigorated or replaced had been tabled before but none came to fruition. So this is a very significant project worthy of recognition by a major national award, although an art prize may seem surprising. </p>
<h2>Creative communities</h2>
<p>But work in this field definitely can be art. Alongside the success of Granby, Liverpool is significant for having other successful <a href="http://www.communitylandtrusts.org.uk/what-is-a-clt">Community Land Trusts</a> (CLT). These organisations are run by ordinary people to develop and manage assets important to their community. <a href="http://www.jeanneworks.net/projects/2up2down___homebaked/">2Up2Down</a>, for example, was a project consciously defined as art and part of the Liverpool Biennale. Artist Jeanne van Heeswijk worked with local people in Anfield to re-imagine their area. Over several years this project grew into a thriving co-operative bakery, <a href="http://homebaked.org.uk/">HomeBaked</a> and a CLT which is now developing affordable housing.</p>
<p>At a CLT network event in 2014, people from around the country talked about the importance of community-based work in moving from “protest to action”. In Granby, the <a href="http://www.granby4streetsclt.co.uk/history-of-the-four-streets/">initial “action” by local residents</a> was guerrilla gardening and painting abandoned houses. Later, a market was set up and a CLT was established. Eventually, working with social investor Steinbeck Studio, the CLT commissioned Assemble for their collaborative approach, to develop and communicate a homegrown vision for the area; together. </p>
<p>Now, the first houses are ready to be homes again and Assemble are still working in the area and collaborating with the people there. Whether or not you see it as art, it is refreshing. Participatory design is not always respected within architecture. But the Assemble approach doesn’t neglect architectural quality. The collective prioritises a real sensitivity that enables excellent design and aspiration while remaining open to collaboration with the communities in question. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105088/original/image-20151209-15552-15mc633.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105088/original/image-20151209-15552-15mc633.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=571&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105088/original/image-20151209-15552-15mc633.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=571&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105088/original/image-20151209-15552-15mc633.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=571&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105088/original/image-20151209-15552-15mc633.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=718&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105088/original/image-20151209-15552-15mc633.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=718&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105088/original/image-20151209-15552-15mc633.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=718&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A Showroom for Granby Workshop (2015).</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">© Tramway</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In addition to their built work, Assemble have established a social enterprise called <a href="http://www.granbyworkshop.co.uk/">Granby Workshop</a>. The workshop uses demolition material to create hand crafted items and profits support an initiative engaging local young people in creative and practical projects. So, using their skills as designers and makers they address issues not always considered to be in the realm of architecture.</p>
<p>Whilst Assemble initially seemed <a href="http://bcove.me/u3gifjfq">slightly uncomfortable</a> by the Turner nomination, their nature as an art and design collective suggests they were never bothered by the boundaries between art and architecture. They might fit into the breed of new architects that Rory Hyde <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=j4KSFkVG3KQC&redir_esc=y">describes</a> as “operating beyond their ability as design professionals … forging a new era of civic responsibility and ethical entrepreneurialism”. </p>
<p>Such an approach requires architects to be excellent designers of course but also good communicators, and listeners. There has to be a sensitivity to the different needs and aspirations of different places and the creativity and confidence to try new things. This is a very artistic kind of sensibility.</p>
<h2>Collaboration</h2>
<p>Within my third-year undergraduate design studio, we’re exploring collaborative working, and other studios place emphasis on making, using traditional or new technologies. And practising what we preach, Head of Liverpool School of Architecture Andrew Crompton and I contribute to the advisory board relating to Ducie Street, the last remaining row of derelict terraces in Granby. It’s exciting to be involved in a new era, working with Steinbeck Studio and Assemble, on a different approach to development. Liverpool is proving to be a test bed for such projects.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105084/original/image-20151209-15552-11ru7a3.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105084/original/image-20151209-15552-11ru7a3.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105084/original/image-20151209-15552-11ru7a3.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105084/original/image-20151209-15552-11ru7a3.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105084/original/image-20151209-15552-11ru7a3.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105084/original/image-20151209-15552-11ru7a3.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105084/original/image-20151209-15552-11ru7a3.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Derelict Ducie Street.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">© Emma Curtin</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Pleased as I am that the spotlight is now on Assemble and their place and people sensitive approach, there is still a niggling concern at the blurring of boundaries. I can’t help thinking that perhaps the “art” label designates Assemble and the Granby project as an outsider, unique, not something that can be replicated.</p>
<p>Grayson recounts how he felt when someone questioned his insistence that his TV programmes were not art but TV: “I wanted to hit her over the head with my BAFTA.” Assemble’s work in Granby may be art practice but it is also a successful approach to the provision of affordable housing and urban regeneration in an area where many projects have failed. So it is not only successful as art but measured on its own terms as architecture and urban regeneration. The Turner Prize must not allow an excuse to ignore this success.</p>
<p>Assemble <a href="http://assemblestudio.co.uk/?page_id=48">describe themselves</a> as “seeking to address the typical disconnection between the public and the process by which places are made”. This is a critical point which strikes at the heart of discontent about our urban environments and it is a goal that must be allowed to have influence beyond the art world.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/52035/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Emma Curtin works for Liverpool University and consults on the Ducie Street Project for Steinbeck Studio.
Emma is chair of Friends of London Road Fire Station and she is affiliated with the Labour Party.
Projects with Friends of London Road Fire Station have received funding from The Community Assets in Difficult Ownership Programme. </span></em></p>
Perhaps the “art” label designates Assemble and the Granby project as outsiders, unique, creating something that can’t be replicated.
Emma Curtin, Architect and University Teacher, University of Liverpool
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/48454
2015-10-02T15:12:26Z
2015-10-02T15:12:26Z
Turner shortlisted artist: the prize machine stifles art
<p>The latest exhibition for the biggest award in contemporary British art, the Turner Prize, is now open at Glasgow’s Tramway. It comes as no surprise that responses to the show of the four shortlisted artists have so far <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2015/sep/30/turner-prize-2015-review-conspiracy-theory-coats">been lukewarm</a>. </p>
<p>As a shortlisted artist participating at the Tate in 1997, the compromises required to make everything “fit” the lumbering Turner Prize machine overwhelmed both the work and possibilities for its interpretation. This year that homogenisation extends to turning Tramway, one of the UK’s most distinctive and cavernous exhibition spaces, into a claustrophobic warren of corridors and white cubes.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/96953/original/image-20151001-29653-w2qx7g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/96953/original/image-20151001-29653-w2qx7g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=808&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/96953/original/image-20151001-29653-w2qx7g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=808&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/96953/original/image-20151001-29653-w2qx7g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=808&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/96953/original/image-20151001-29653-w2qx7g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1015&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/96953/original/image-20151001-29653-w2qx7g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1015&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/96953/original/image-20151001-29653-w2qx7g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1015&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Assemble group photo, 2014.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">© Assemble</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Tramway director, Sarah Munro, <a href="http://www.theskinny.co.uk/art/news/glasgow-turner-prize">has said</a>: “In truth the Turner Prize and those artists associated with it don’t really tell the full story … the context is much more layered.” This hints at the complex power dynamics which dominate the prize. The ethos of the Turner is the antithesis of the artist-led communities and workspaces in which many of the nominated artists were nurtured. Having directed what began life as an artist’s collective, The Collective Gallery in Edinburgh, for many years, Munro is acutely aware of this.</p>
<p>Over the last 15 years, galleries, museums and the Turner Prize itself have struggled to present a more socially engaged practice <a href="http://field-journal.com/issue-1/kester">that crosses</a> “boundaries between art, activism, urbanism, anthropology and many other fields”. Most often this “complex, contradictory and unruly area of practice” loses its vitality in the process.</p>
<p>But this year, <a href="http://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tramway/exhibition/turner-prize-2015/turner-prize-2015-artists-assemble">Assemble</a>, an architecture collective, nominated for their work on a <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/architecture-design-blog/2015/may/12/assemble-turner-prize-2015-wildcard-how-the-young-architecture-crew-assemble-rocked-the-art-world">Liverpool housing project</a>, do manage to look distinctive. They have translated their work into an “exhibit” by building the self-contained, enclosed <a href="http://thespaces.com/2015/10/01/assemble-builds-a-workshop-inside-the-tramway-for-the-turner-prize-show/">Granby Workshop Showroom</a>, with products and samples made by residents in their Liverpool projects, and available to purchase soon.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/97048/original/image-20151002-23058-106vmvs.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/97048/original/image-20151002-23058-106vmvs.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=571&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/97048/original/image-20151002-23058-106vmvs.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=571&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/97048/original/image-20151002-23058-106vmvs.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=571&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/97048/original/image-20151002-23058-106vmvs.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=717&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/97048/original/image-20151002-23058-106vmvs.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=717&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/97048/original/image-20151002-23058-106vmvs.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=717&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Assemble, A Showroom for Granby Workshop (2015).</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Keith Hunter, Tramway.</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Tate on tour</h2>
<p>Locating the Turner show in Glasgow is also part of this push to extend boundaries and venture beyond the ivory towers of Bankside’s Tate Britain. This year’s show is the fourth of its now biennial manifestations outside of London, having already decamped around the country to venues in Liverpool, Newcastle, and Derry. </p>
<p>Penelope Curtis, Tate Britain’s director, says:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Given how many artists from Glasgow have made up the Turner Prize shortlists over recent years, it is great to have the prize on show in Tramway, which feels like a natural home for the prize this year.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>“Home” is an emotive idea. In the run up to the exhibition, home and identity have dominated discussions for all the wrong reasons. For the first time since 2004, none of the four shortlisted Turner Prize artists are Scottish, or based in Scotland. Outraged <a href="http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/13213474.Revealed__no_Scots_in_Turner_Prize_2015_short_list_in_year_it_will_be_staged_in_Glasgow/">local press</a> speculate about their deliberate exclusion by the prize’s selection committee, while Guardian critic, Jonathan Jones <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/2015/aug/18/the-turner-prize-bus-tours-tartan-fetishism-petty-scotland-britain">was outraged</a> that an accompanying <a href="http://www.travellinggallery.com/">touring exhibition</a> of previous Scottish Turner Prize winners and nominees “reeks of Tartan fetishism”.</p>
<p>But the fuss around (the exclusion of) the home team overshadows the fact that, for the first time in years, all of the artists actually have London as their chosen base.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/97051/original/image-20151002-13364-1l4gjm1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/97051/original/image-20151002-13364-1l4gjm1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/97051/original/image-20151002-13364-1l4gjm1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/97051/original/image-20151002-13364-1l4gjm1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/97051/original/image-20151002-13364-1l4gjm1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/97051/original/image-20151002-13364-1l4gjm1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/97051/original/image-20151002-13364-1l4gjm1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Not breaking out with much success.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">chrisdorney/ shutterstock.com</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The continued draw of the capital is at odds with a general perception that artists are fleeing to northern parts because of the pace of gentrification. Artists occupy a new area; are inevitably evicted as it becomes more desirable; the space is then co-opted by investors. This is not to say that cities outside London feel any benefit from this: although the gentrification of London may continuously uproot artists from their communities, the city is overwhelmingly good for the art market and, in turn, for institutions like the Tate. Despite rocketing prices, London retains its artistic allure.</p>
<p>This is in stark contrast to Derry, the venue for the 2013 Turner Prize, where the planned “cultural hub” around the gallery which hosted the exhibition is now an office complex. The same cycle can be seen repeated in the other Turner Prize host cities outside of London.</p>
<p>At a recent symposium in Newcastle’s <a href="http://thenewbridgeproject.com/">NewBridge Project</a>, the 200 or so tenants of this artist-led community of studios and exhibition spaces at risk of losing their city centre premises to redevelopment, were asked whether it was time for artists to “grow up” and accept the new agenda of cuts, philanthropy and big business sponsorship. <a href="https://www.a-n.co.uk/news/time-to-grow-up-id-rather-stand-up-and-be-counted">Their answer</a> resonates for any artist trying to find a way to work and survive while negotiating situations which are out with their control: “No, we don’t need to grow up – not if growing up means compromising our values or forgetting why we became artists in the first place.”</p>
<h2>Environmental art</h2>
<p>For me, returning back to working as an artist in Glasgow after the Turner Prize meant the simple pleasures of home and a clear artistic identity, built on a slow and steadily developed practice; creating my own, unmediated relationship with the “public” who were at the centre of my research and practice. This way of working was fostered by the core curriculum of the <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2011/oct/17/glasgow-turner-prize">environmental art</a> department at Glasgow School of Art, where I studied. Regular public art projects forced students out of their studios to consider how to make work in public space, temporarily exhibiting the results in that context.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/97047/original/image-20151002-23065-m3w3xg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/97047/original/image-20151002-23065-m3w3xg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/97047/original/image-20151002-23065-m3w3xg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/97047/original/image-20151002-23065-m3w3xg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/97047/original/image-20151002-23065-m3w3xg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/97047/original/image-20151002-23065-m3w3xg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/97047/original/image-20151002-23065-m3w3xg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">From Turner Prize Exhibition, 1997, Detail ‘After A True Story, Giant & Fairy Tales’ Christine Borland, Glasgow Life, Glasgow Museums.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">© Christine Borland. Photography by Alan McAteer</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>While Tate branding will always reinforce the association with the capital, a lasting legacy of the Turner’s residency in Glasgow would be for the prize, to become truly itinerant, allowing artists and their works to move out of the bricks and mortar of the white gallery space all together.</p>
<p>This direct response to artist’s working methods would allow freedom for both them and audiences from the hierarchies which currently permeate and dominate too many of the debates around the Turner. Experience of the Turner Prize would be based on public participation, not a second-hand media storm in a teacup or <a href="http://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tramway/exhibition/turner-prize-2015">reliance on</a> the accompanying “programme of workshops, talks, tours and activities for people of all ages to get involved and be inspired by the creative work on show”. </p>
<p>Nicholas Serota, director of Tate, <a href="https://www.a-n.co.uk/news/expanded-tate-modern-to-open-june-2016">tells us</a> that the Tate Modern extension will be “a communal place where people can meet to share, debate and create”. It is time the same aspiration was extended to enable the Turner Prize to really come “home” and find a place where the power of the art, not the structures of power, is centre stage.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/48454/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Christine Borland's work is included in the Travelling Gallery exhibition, 'Eyes on the Prize' which is mentioned in this article.</span></em></p>
Shortlisted for the Turner in 1997, Christine Borland discusses the suffocating nature of the prize and its shortsighted attempts to branch out.
Christine Borland, Professor of Art, Northumbria University, Newcastle
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/38430
2015-03-09T18:50:00Z
2015-03-09T18:50:00Z
On judging art prizes (it’s all subjective, isn’t it?)
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/73892/original/image-20150305-1920-kw3fi3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Is it just a matter of taste when judges pick the winners of art prizes? Actually, that's not the case.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Mid-West Art Prize/Ted Snell</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The first response you receive when you are identified as the judge of an art exhibition is sympathy – not for the difficult task ahead but because your decisions will most likely be challenged. Assessing art is regarded as “so subjective” that ultimately the decision you make will be simply a “matter of personal opinion” and hence unsupportable in any public forum.</p>
<p>Misguided and inherently insulting as these presumptions are, they are presented with concerned deference. What they imply is that you are working on very shaky ground with a complete lack of evidence on which to justify your decisions.</p>
<p>Although propelled into this position of power you and your fellow judges have feet of clay and with no court of appeal to confirm your pronouncements everyone has the license to disagree with impunity. It is an attitude that undermines the arts and relegates them to the minor leagues in a society where scientific objectivity is the gold standard.</p>
<p>The same principles that underscore assessment and review in science or any discipline are also the basis of judgements made in the arts. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/73894/original/image-20150305-1942-8cdx1l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/73894/original/image-20150305-1942-8cdx1l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/73894/original/image-20150305-1942-8cdx1l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/73894/original/image-20150305-1942-8cdx1l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/73894/original/image-20150305-1942-8cdx1l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/73894/original/image-20150305-1942-8cdx1l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/73894/original/image-20150305-1942-8cdx1l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/73894/original/image-20150305-1942-8cdx1l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Penny Coss won second prize at the Mid-West Art Prize for On my Radar.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Mid-West Art Prize/Ted Snell</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Wittgenstein’s animals</h2>
<p>As philosopher <a href="http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/wittgenstein/">Ludwig Wittgenstein</a> pointed out with his duck/rabbit illustration, whatever the field of inquiry there is always a degree of interpretation that is required to make sense of the objective data before us. </p>
<p>It is possible to cite the objective features of this drawing to confirm its reading as either a duck or a rabbit. Neither is wrong because it is possible to explain to others how you arrived at your interpretation based on the evidence before you.</p>
<p>Of course if they fail to see how that line can be read as a duck once they have confirmed it in their consciousness as a rabbit this doesn’t undermine the objectivity of both readings, because while it is possible to interpret the line as either a duck or a rabbit, there are not unlimited choices. </p>
<p>It cannot be read as a ship or a grain silo, for example, because the objective evidence won’t support that interpretation.</p>
<p>Experience and informed knowledge of any field increases a person’s ability to make these reasoned interpretations. </p>
<p>In science, the law, sport or almost any sphere of interest expertise is acknowledged – yet in the arts specialist knowledge is demoted to a form of effete connoisseurship. No matter how many qualifications or years of professional engagement you have your credibility is undermined by this assumption of subjectivity.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/73893/original/image-20150305-1934-glycbl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/73893/original/image-20150305-1934-glycbl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/73893/original/image-20150305-1934-glycbl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/73893/original/image-20150305-1934-glycbl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/73893/original/image-20150305-1934-glycbl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/73893/original/image-20150305-1934-glycbl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/73893/original/image-20150305-1934-glycbl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/73893/original/image-20150305-1934-glycbl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Frank Walsh Snr – winner of the Mid-West Aboriginal Prize for Wandarrie Country Rock Art.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Mid-West Art Prize/Ted Snell</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Why these judges?</h2>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/73895/original/image-20150305-1923-673nwf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/73895/original/image-20150305-1923-673nwf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/73895/original/image-20150305-1923-673nwf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/73895/original/image-20150305-1923-673nwf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/73895/original/image-20150305-1923-673nwf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/73895/original/image-20150305-1923-673nwf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/73895/original/image-20150305-1923-673nwf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/73895/original/image-20150305-1923-673nwf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Kieran Ingram’s Old Lies won the Youth Award at the Mid-West Art Prize.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Mid-West Art Prize/Ted Snell</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>My role as one of the three judges of the <a href="http://artgallery.cgg.wa.gov.au/mid-west-art-prize/mid-west-art-prize-2015-2">Mid-West Art Prize at Geraldton </a>in Western Australia brought these issues once more into focus. </p>
<p>The same suppositions about reliance on personal preference were “sympathetically” offered by concerned members of the audience – yet I would contend that the process my fellow judges Paola Anselmi and Allison Archer undertook was an excellent example of objectivity in decision-making.</p>
<p>First, we were well qualified and experienced in the visual arts. </p>
<p>We all have professional careers as arts administrators, curators, and writers, and we are well versed in looking at artworks and understanding the creative process. Our task was very specific, and the criteria on which we made our judgements were clearly articulated. As a result, we were well prepared for the task of assessing, comparing and reviewing the sixty works hung in the Geraldton Regional Art Gallery. </p>
<p>Following an independent assessment of the exhibition we regrouped to discuss our judgements and we concurred unanimously on our choice of the winning entry in five of the six categories. </p>
<p>In the final category, we all listed the same two artists and made a final decision on a majority vote.</p>
<p>This unanimity is not unusual yet it is always greeted with surprise or even disbelief. </p>
<p>While Chair of the Visual Arts Board of the Australia Council, I was required to report on the seven-member panels decisions where the standard deviation was greater than 3 on a ranking scale of 7. </p>
<p>After assessing 800 or more applications, this situation arose in less than 10% of decisions across the entire portfolio of applications. In the New Work Emerging and Established categories it was less than 6%. Most often this was not a disagreement on whether or not the candidate should or should not be awarded a grant but on the degree of support.</p>
<p>In Geraldton, the consistency and objectivity of our assessment process led to a unanimous decision to award Paul Kaptein’s remarkable portrait of a FIFO miner Everything is Nothing this year’s Mid-West Art Prize and Penny Coss’s painting On my Radar the second prize. </p>
<p>Frank Walsh Snr was awarded the Mid-West Aboriginal Prize for Wandarrie Country Rock Art, Kieran Ingram’s Old Lies won the Youth Award and Karl Monaghan won the Mid West award for his print Heads Up with the Highly Commended award going to Vicki Hardy’s Consequences.</p>
<p>Rather than be being a matter of personal opinion we brought our knowledge and experience to the process of evaluation and the resulting unanimity underscored the objectivity of our decision-making.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/38430/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ted Snell does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
How do the judges of art prizes make their decisions? Contrary to popular perception, it’s not just a matter of personal opinion and effete connoisseurship.
Ted Snell, Winthrop Professor, Director Cultural Precinct, The University of Western Australia
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/29463
2014-07-24T20:29:20Z
2014-07-24T20:29:20Z
The Basil Sellers prize gives artists a sporting chance at success
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/54728/original/s6yrwrmx-1406168097.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Narelle Autio, Nipper II 2013, type C photograph, 110 x 160 cm (sheet)
edition 1 of 5.
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">© Courtesy the artist, Stills Gallery, Sydney; and Hugo Michell Gallery, Adelaide</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Tonight the winner of the fourth A$100,000 <a href="http://www.sellersartprize.com.au/">Basil Sellers Art Prize</a> will be announced at the <a href="http://www.art-museum.unimelb.edu.au/">Ian Potter Museum of Art</a> in Melbourne, chosen from <a href="http://www.sellersartprize.com.au/artists-and-exhibition/2014/">a shortlist</a> of 16 artists and decided by a panel of six judges, including me. </p>
<p>It’s easy to be sceptical about art prizes in Australia. There’s so many of them, for starters. More than 100 on my last count. Many artists don’t like them. They’re uncomfortable with situations that divide the field into winners and losers, or reduce everything to a beauty contest. </p>
<p>So what sets the Sellers apart from the 101 other art prizes in Australia?</p>
<h2>Building a better art prize</h2>
<p>Early in 2006, businessman and art collector <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basil_Sellers">Basil Sellers</a> approached me with a simple proposition. He wanted to encourage Australian artists to engage with an ignored topic, sport. His plan was just as simple; he would offer a substantial cash prize as an incentive.</p>
<p>“Let’s make it the richest prize in the country,” said Basil. It might seem strange, but my immediate response was, “Not so fast”.</p>
<p>Prizes aren’t always as beneficial to artists as you’d think. An artist must make a new work (there’s a cost, in time, money and opportunity), possibly on a narrow theme that would make the work hard to sell. They have to deliver and retrieve the art work (another cost) and often pay their own way to events.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/54725/original/hv78qvww-1406167797.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/54725/original/hv78qvww-1406167797.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/54725/original/hv78qvww-1406167797.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/54725/original/hv78qvww-1406167797.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/54725/original/hv78qvww-1406167797.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/54725/original/hv78qvww-1406167797.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/54725/original/hv78qvww-1406167797.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/54725/original/hv78qvww-1406167797.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Khaled Sabsabi, Wonderland (video still) 2014, dual channel HD video, colour, sound, 25 minutes 30 seconds.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">© Courtesy the artist and Milani Gallery, Brisbane</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Artists who make the final cut may find their work displayed unsystematically, without the supporting elements – catalogue, interpretative labels, education programs, floor talks — associated with a major exhibition. </p>
<p>The prize money itself is not always large, and many artists would see applying for a grant as a better use of their time. (Surprisingly, the odds of securing a grant are better than winning an art prize: 1 in 800 for the <a href="http://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/prizes/archibald/2014/">Archibald Prize</a>, closer to 1 in 30 for a grant.) </p>
<p>Art prize exhibitions can have a “flash in the pan” character. The media focus is on the announcement of the winner. And it can feel as if the art has been brought together somewhat arbitrarily. As artist-musician Brian Eno wrote in his <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/160117.A_Year_With_Swollen_Appendices">A Year With Swollen Appendices</a> (1996), you might just as well award art prizes for “Best painting of a whale” or “Best picture done in the dark”.</p>
<h2>Planning the Sellers</h2>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/54733/original/wc8rt5n5-1406169610.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/54733/original/wc8rt5n5-1406169610.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/54733/original/wc8rt5n5-1406169610.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=899&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/54733/original/wc8rt5n5-1406169610.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=899&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/54733/original/wc8rt5n5-1406169610.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=899&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/54733/original/wc8rt5n5-1406169610.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1129&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/54733/original/wc8rt5n5-1406169610.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1129&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/54733/original/wc8rt5n5-1406169610.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1129&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Tony Albert, Once upon a time… (detail) 2014, watercolour, gouache, printed book covers, collage, paper, wooden blocks, plastic figurines, vinyl, 27 components, installation (variable): 200 x 300 cm.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">© Courtesy the artist and Sullivan+Strumpf, Sydney</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>That’s why I approached the idea of a substantial new art prize with caution, even though art and sport were topics dear to me. The risk was that Basil Seller’s vision and generosity could look like an eccentric whim tempting artists to leave their own goals behind in pursuit of the winner’s cheque.</p>
<p>Long-term philanthropic impact is achieved by balancing the donor’s goals with the complex needs of the field they wish to support. What we had to do was improve the way art prizes were run, so that entrants would see it as a serious professional opportunity rather than another lottery. </p>
<p>And we had to build Basil’s personal interests into a game-changing art prize, demonstrating that sport was generating cutting-edge art. </p>
<p>Ideally, we might even change the story of Australian art, encouraging audiences to recognise a tradition of artists using sport to explore Australian identity.</p>
<p>So I drew up a business plan – yes, that’s what art museum directors do these days – focussing on the challenges facing a “start up” art prize in a crowded field. The theme of sport wasn’t a problem. Numerous contemporary artists were fascinated by the global, televisual economy of modern sport. And plenty of them simply loved, and played, sports.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/54736/original/7nx2smy5-1406169734.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/54736/original/7nx2smy5-1406169734.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/54736/original/7nx2smy5-1406169734.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/54736/original/7nx2smy5-1406169734.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/54736/original/7nx2smy5-1406169734.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/54736/original/7nx2smy5-1406169734.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/54736/original/7nx2smy5-1406169734.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/54736/original/7nx2smy5-1406169734.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">2012 winner Jon Campbell and Dream team 2012, enamel paint on plywood, 22 paintings, installation (variable): 300 x 300 cm.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">© Courtesy the artist, Kalimanrawlins, Melbourne; and Darren Knight Gallery, Sydney Photo: Peter Casamento</span></span>
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<p>We began by opening up the parameters of the prize. Where most are restricted by medium (say, photography) or genre (say, portraiture); we threw it open to any art form. Most allow only a single entry; we encouraged artists to show multiple works, so that visitors could connect with their art in depth. </p>
<p>Many prizes are a “pay to play” affair; we offered every finalist a A$3000 fee, freight, airfare, accommodation and an exhibition with all the trimmings. In fact, more than two-thirds of the project budget is spent directly on supporting and promoting the artists. </p>
<p>The A$100,000 first prize is a nice round number but was actually set against the median artists’ income (<a href="http://www.australiacouncil.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0007/79072/Artist_career_research_summary.pdf">A$36,000 in 2007/08</a>). The winner’s cheque was designed to set an artist up for two-years’ focus on their art, with a subsequent boost to their professional success. </p>
<p>Or, as we used to say behind the scenes, “quit your day job”. In addition, one of the finalists is also selected for a one-year A$50,000 creative fellowship at Melbourne’s <a href="http://www.nsm.org.au/About%20NSM/Fellowships/Basil%20Sellers%20Creative%20Arts%20Fellowship.asp">National Sports Museum</a>. </p>
<p>These days, there’s more to supporting an artist than money alone; doors can be opened, connections made and the artist’s interests fertilised.</p>
<p>Our focus was on making the prize exhibition a serious platform for discovering, engaging with and promoting contemporary art. The profile and reputation of every finalist should be enhanced, not just the winner. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/54742/original/rgxg9v3f-1406170794.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/54742/original/rgxg9v3f-1406170794.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/54742/original/rgxg9v3f-1406170794.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/54742/original/rgxg9v3f-1406170794.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/54742/original/rgxg9v3f-1406170794.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/54742/original/rgxg9v3f-1406170794.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/54742/original/rgxg9v3f-1406170794.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/54742/original/rgxg9v3f-1406170794.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Shaun Gladwell, The archer (after Chuang Tzu) (production still) 2014, single-channel HD video, 16:9 ratio, colour, sound, 10:47 minutes.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">© Courtesy the artist, Anna Schwartz Gallery and Arenamedia</span></span>
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<h2>So, has it worked?</h2>
<p>A crucial decision was to make the prize bi-annual; giving the finalists almost a year to prepare their entries. The Potter’s curators work closely with the artists, rather than simply taking delivery of their work. The result is that finalists have repeatedly told me that the Basil Sellers prize is among their best museum experiences. And with each exhibition, they demonstrate that sport is genuinely the territory of cutting edge art.</p>
<p>Since the first award in 2008, we’ve seen signs of the impact of our decisions. Most of the finalists’ art works are sold, many of them to major public galleries. There has been an increasing number of exhibitions across the country on the theme of sport. And other art prizes have improved the support they offer artists and their investment in art prize exhibitions. </p>
<p>The downside? There are still winners and losers. No matter how much support we give finalists, we still put them under emotional strain. You wouldn’t be human if you didn’t dream of winning, or were disappointed when you didn’t.</p>
<p><br></p>
<p><em>The <a href="http://www.art-museum.unimelb.edu.au/exhibitions/exhib-date/2014-07-22/exhib/basil-sellers-art-prize-4">Basil Sellers Art Prize 4</a> exhibition runs at the Ian Potter Museum of Art until Sunday October 16.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/29463/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Chris McAuliffe is a paid consultant assisting with the operation of the Basil Sellers Art Prize. From 2000-2013, he was Director of the Ian Potter Museum of Art, which manages and exhibits the prize.</span></em></p>
Tonight the winner of the fourth A$100,000 Basil Sellers Art Prize will be announced at the Ian Potter Museum of Art in Melbourne, chosen from a shortlist of 16 artists and decided by a panel of six judges…
Chris McAuliffe, Independent art historian and Honorary Fellow at the Australian Centre, The University of Melbourne
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.