The Australian Art Prize Season

The Australian Art Prize Season: It’s as exciting and unpredictable as the Melbourne Cup!

There is such an exciting and positive vibe at KAB Gallery throughout Prize season! I love finding out when artists are shortlisted, made finalists or winners – its such a thrill!

I am particularly proud of Peter Smeeth’s Packing Room Prize win this year! I was excited when Peter told me that he was painting the Today Show’s Lisa Wilkinson for the Archibald and I knew it would be wonderful. Lisa is an amazing woman whom I personally admire for her kind nature and trailblazing media career. I was delighted to see the finished artwork and learn of Peter’s win.

Prize season is always exciting at KAB Gallery. Many of the artists we exhibit are regular finalists and winners of Australia’s top prizes so we always wait for the results with bated breath!

It’s interesting to sit back and consider the prizes from my point of view, since I often become as emotionally invested in the process and results. From working with an artist to contact celebrities and arrange sittings to catching a glimpse of a work in progress on a studio visit. This is certainly a part of my job that I love – I admire artists dedication to their practice and celebrate their wins with them.

There are various reasons why artists enter prizes. For some it’s the opportunity to be formally recognised for their art style and practice, for others it’s the prize money and exposure, and for some its simply the challenge of creating something great under the pressure of the entry deadline. Other times artists can be driven by the challenge of painting a familiar face or representing another side to a celebrity personality. KAB Gallery represented artist Sally West is currently painting Tony Abbott. She is not political in any way but when I asked her about the first sitting experience she said “I wanted to get to know him a little on a personal note. To depict him as the person, not the politician. Perhaps he is more used to talking politics than his personal life.” I have seen a few previews of related works from the sittings and they are really unexpected – I hope to unveil some soon at KAB Gallery.

KAB Gallery artist, Andy Collis, painted Lindy Chamberlain for the Doug Moran Portrait Prize, as part of an experiment for his PhD (Titled: “The Human Touch”). He told me that he felt a certain connection to Lindy from all the media coverage she was represented in, and wondered whether a painting created from real-life sittings with his subject would capture the same or a different side to her than what he had become familiar with through the media. This challenge was based on the fact that most museums have a principal of only hanging portraits painted either from life or from reference photographs taken during a sitting – this means Andy Warhol’s famous portrait of Marilyn Monroe would not traditionally be hung in a gallery!

For other artists, entering prizes is an amazing opportunity to collect direct and valuable feedback on their practice. Earlier in his career, KAB Gallery artist Benjamin Tankard was awarded as a finalist in the Sulman Prize. Benjamin found comfort and encouragement from the words of former Director of the Art Gallery of NSW, Edmund Capon, who said of Benjamin’s Unpopular Penguin series: “An evocative imagining of the familiar Penguin Paperback… it was a painting we all liked very much for its rich texture, its sense of memory and it’s sort of nostalgic humour”. While certainly possible, it is highly unlikely that an artist starting out in their career would be able to gain access to such a well-respected art industry insider any other way, much less receive such marvellous feedback and encouragement to hold his career in good stead for many years. Work from this series and several of Benjamin’s other series will be featured at KAB Gallery in the August Exhibition: Contempo at KAB. View the artworks in the Terrigal Gallery all August (Open Daily 10am-5pm). Benjamin Tankard was a 2012 finalist in the Sulman Prize.

To be featured at “Contempo at KAB Gallery” August 2017

To be featured at “Contempo at KAB Gallery” August 2017

Whatever the intention, an artist who wins a prize or makes the finalist list will have the opportunity to exhibit their work for a fresh audience. In fact it is interesting to consider the exposure from a statistical perspective. An artist may open their studio once a month to welcome audiences to view their work, perhaps showing 5-20 people. However if they are exhibited as a finalist or winner in the Archibald Prize they know their art will be credited in full view of more than 50,000 visitors. For a professional artist, this is worth the annual effort alone! Don’t forget to also consider that they are receiving the prestigious acknowledgement amongst various related media coverage.

I think for some, it takes a lot of courage to put their art before the judges and making the cut as a finalist and/taking the win is a career thrill. I don’t always think it’s important to focus on the winner alone because the judging panels can vary, and sometimes audiences can often be left questioning why a particular artwork has won. This is when the awards such as the Packing Room Prize and The People’s Choice are important. These alternate awards are honest feedback from the masses of people whose criteria is more trend bias. Trends and timeless talent is awarded with these open prizes – very important things to consider when purchasing art.

The formal judging process is confusing – it’s criteria formulated but at the end of the day art is a subjective product and everybody connects and views it differently. Take a look back at Craig Ruddy’ s “David Gulpilil, two worlds” (Archibald Winner 2004) – was it a painting or a drawing? The criteria clearly states on the Archibald entry form that the artwork must be a painting but this artwork was created using mixed medias including charcoal, pencil, conte sticks, acyrylic paint, pastels, crayons etc. Not to mention the way he applied the mediums was not your traditional painterly method. This resulted in a two-day court hearing to define the term “painting”. In the end it was awarded the win and also achieved the People’s Choice – it went on to be sold at Sotheby’s in 2006 for more than $300,000.

THIS SEASON’S RECENT NEWS – KAB Gallery 

• Peter Smeeth WINS Packing Room Prize (2017) AGNSW Archibald Entry
• Sally West (currently shortlisted) for NSW Parliament Plein-Air Prize
• Sally West FINALIST Manning Art Prize
• Greg Jarmaine WINNER (Section 1) Oil & Acrylic of the Bright Art Annual Autumn Art Show
• Sally West FINALIST Waverley Art Prize 

As you can probably see, at KAB Gallery we are big fans of Art Prize season. Whenever a newly starting out artist asks me for advice on how to progress in their career, my key recommendation is always to enter as many prizes relevant to their art practice as possible. The exposure, feedback and experience in itself is more than worth their time. And who knows, they may even win the big prize money to set them up for the rest of their career!  

About the author

KERRY-ANNE BLANKET

Director & Curator - KAB Gallery

KAB Gallery’s Kerry-Anne Blanket holds a Bachelor of Visual Arts and two Masters degrees (Hons) from the University of Sydney. With an extensive career in art education along with the management of museums and investment art galleries, Kerry-Anne can offer premier art consulting to her clients and source specially requested works. 

She has a keen eye for detail, comprehensive art market knowledge and a love of all things beautiful. Kerry-Anne works directly with artists and collectors alike to curate interesting and eclectic exhibitions.