Artist Trevor Nickolls Wins Australia's Blake Prize for Religious Art with "Metamorphosis"

THE HERALD SUN
By Louise Nun

Late South Australian artist Trevor Nickolls in 2012 with his painting "Metamorphosis", which has won the 2013 Blake Prize for religious art. Source: News Limited

AUSTRALIA---A NEW indigenous art prize established in the memory of late South Australian artist Trevor Nickolls has been given a $25,000 boost after the painter was awarded the Blake Prize, the first ever to be awarded posthumously. Nickolls, who died last year aged 63, won top honours in the national prize for religious art for his painting Metamorphosis, which depicts an Aboriginal man transformed into a butterfly, surrounded by peace doves. Metamorphosis, which melds the Western and Indigenous iconography Nickolls was known for, was commissioned for the 2012 Adelaide Festival exhibition Deadly: In-Between Heaven and Hell, held at Tandanya. [link]

Read More

Blake Prize: Emerging Religious Artists Take on Established for Fiercely Fought Accolade

THE GUARDIAN
By Andrew Frost

Contender: The Edge, 2013, by Tamara Dean. Photograph: Olsen Irwin Gallery

AUSTRALIA---The shortlist for the 62nd Blake prize has been announced, naming 73 established and emerging artists. The prize explores religious and spiritual themes in art and, although that might suggest traditional religious subjects and treatments, the attraction of the Blake for many artists – and often the source of the prize’s occasional conflicts with conservative – is that it also encourages and celebrates secular ideas of religiosity, as well as broader questions of the role of ethics and morality in contemporary society. [link]

Read More

ArtPrize 2013's $100,000 "Juried" Grand Prize Comes From Spain

THE GRAND RAPIDS POST
By Jeffrey Kaczmarczyk

MICHIGAN---Carlos Bunga, winner of the ArtPrize 2013 $100,000 Juried Grand Prize, uses simple materials such as cardboard and tape. The Portuguese-born artist creates site-specific installations throughout the world in places such as the Kunstraum Kreuzberg/Bethanien in Berlin, the Biennale Internazionale di Scultura di Carrara in Italy and the Miami Art Museum. Bunga traveled from his home in Barcelona, Spain, to become the first international artist to win a top prize in the world's largest art prize. Bunga's installation, "Ecosystem," a site-specific, architectural intervention at SiTE:LAB @ 54 Jefferson, was selected from a field of all 1,524 entries in ArtPrize for the award given Friday evening at the ArtPrize Awards Night.[link]

Read More

ArtPrize 2013's $200,000 "Public Vote" Grand Prize Sees Victory as Boost for Quilt-Making as Artform

GRAND RAPIDS PRESS
By Jeffrey Kaczmarczyk

MICHIGAN---ArtPrize 2013's $200,000 First Prize winner Ann Loveless thinks her victory in the fifth annual competition is going to be a game changer for her genre. "Sleeping Bear Dune Lakeshore," depicting a scene of Lake Michigan, had visitors at ArtPrize convinced it was something else. "They think it's a photograph or an oil painting. I'd tell them, no," Loveless said. "They'd say, 'No way." "When you get closer, you realize it's made out of fabric," she said. The four-paneled quilt, 5 feet tall, 20 feet long, is the first textile to win the world's largest art prize. "Textiles aren't considered fine arts. They think of the quilt on the bed. But definitely this is art," she said. "I think next year, we'll have a lot of textile entries. I think I'm paving the way for quilters in general." [link]

Read More

ArtStart: ArtPrize Launches New Online Competition for Youth

GRAND RAPIDS PRESS
By Monica Scott

MICHIGAN---ArtPrize is putting the spotlight squarely on youth this fall with its new online competition - ArtStart - challenging them to create an artwork as a reaction to their experience at the international event. The competition is for young people under age 18 and they can enter all forms of art, including video, short stories, photography, painting, drawing, and sculpture. Individuals, school groups, and families are all encouraged to participate. All artwork created must include three "ArtPrize Elements" such as ArtPrize registered works of art, or ArtPrize themes such as "the public vs. the juried vote." Winners will be selected by grade and everyone that makes the top 10 will be awarded a gift to be revealed at a later date. Education Team created an Education Youth Advisory Committee, made up of seven Kent County high school students, to help them with the initiative and develop other programing for young people. The students, who applied and were interviewed, attend City High-Middle School, Caledonia, East Grand Rapids, and East Kentwood high schools. They created a "How to" video about how to apply for ArtStart and will judge the competition. [link]

Read More