The prestigious Turner Prize has been won by Lubaina Himid. At age 63 she is the oldest recipient of the prize since it launched in 1984. This time around the exhibition is on view in Hull the UK’s City Of Culture. The 2017 award announced by DJ, producer and artist Goldie took place tonight, Tuesday 5 December from 21:30 GMT. The prize is the most important accolade given to a contemporary artist living in Britain. The awards ceremony took place inside Hull Minster and was shown live on the BBC, the broadcast partner for the prize, guaranteeing everyone had a front row seat for the event.
This year the Turner committee scrapped the under 50 age ceiling which was deemed ageist. Rosalind Nashashibi, Lubaina Himid, Hurvin Anderson, and Andrea Buttner the four artists up for Britain’s most prestigious art award have been waiting since the spring to find out who will be chosen. Turner Prize 2017 is now on display at the Ferens Art Gallery and runs until 7 January 2018. The exhibition is a highlight of Hull UK City of Culture 2017 and has attracted more than 65,000 visitors since opening to the public on 26 September.
The jury applauded the four nominated artists for their socially engaged and visually imaginative work.
The prize was given to Lubaina Himid for a trio of outstanding shows in Oxford, Bristol and Nottingham. The jury praised the artist for her uncompromising tackling of issues including colonial history and how racism persists today. They admire her expansive and exuberant approach to painting which combines satire and a sense of theatre. The jury also acknowledged her role as an influential curator and educator who continues to speak urgently to the moment.
The Turner Prize award is £40,000 with £25,000 going to the winner and £5,000 each for the other shortlisted artists. The winner will be decided by the Turner Prize 2017 jury who are: Dan Fox, writer and co-editor of Frieze; Martin Herbert, art critic; Mason Leaver-Yap, Walker Art Center’s Bentson Scholar of Moving Image and Associate Curator at KW Institute for Contemporary Art in Berlin; and Emily Pethick, Director of Showroom. The jury is chaired by Alex Farquharson, Director of Tate Britain.
Turner Prize 2017 is curated by critic, educator and curator, Sasha Craddock, Chair of New Contemporaries, and George Vasey, curatorial fellow at Newcastle University and writer.
As part of the joint public programme, the Ferens Art Gallery will, with Hull 2017, host a special Lates event, Turner // Return, on Thursday 16 November, with a variety of music, entertainment, talks and other attractions.
Martin Green, Director of Hull UK City of Culture 2017, said: “We are thrilled that Goldie has agreed to present this year’s Turner Prize in Hull. The shortlisted artists have together produced a show that offers powerful commentary on current issues, and it is brilliant to have someone whose own work has continually reflected what is going on around him presenting the award.
Councillor Stephen Brady, Leader of Hull City Council, said: “It is fantastic to see so much interest in the Turner Prize within the first four weeks of the exhibition opening. The enthusiasm has been incredible and everyone is talking about it, which demonstrates people’s intrigue and appetite for contemporary art. Visitors are embracing the show and also enjoying the gallery’s strong permanent collection.
“We are delighted to see so many people visiting the Ferens and it is continuing to be an incredible year for the gallery and the city.”
For projects including solo exhibitions Lubaina Himid: Invisible Strategies at Modern Art Oxford and Navigation Charts at Spike Island in Bristol, as well as her participation in the group exhibition The Place is Here at Nottingham Contemporary. The jury praised these exhibitions for addressing pertinent questions of personal and political identity. As a key figure of the Black Arts Movement, Himid has consistently foregrounded the contribution of the African diaspora to Western culture. Working across painting, installation, drawing and printmaking, and bringing both old and new work together, her work is both visually arresting and critical.
For his solo exhibitions Hurvin Anderson: Dub Versions at New Art Exchange in Nottingham and Hurvin Anderson: Backdrop at the Art Gallery of Ontario in Canada. The jury praised Anderson as an outstanding British painter whose art speaks to our current political moment with questions about identity and belonging and recognised a deeper interplay between figuration and abstraction in his work. Drawing from art history as much as his own Caribbean heritage, the artist’s dream-like paintings are compositionally dense and vibrant, combining geometric and gestural shapes alongside portraiture, landscape and still-life.
For her solo exhibitions Andrea Büttner: Gesamtzusammenhang at Kunsthalle Sankt Gallen in Switzerland and Andrea Büttner at David Kordansky in Los Angeles. The jury noted Büttner’s unique approach to collaboration and her exploration of religion, morality and ethics, articulated through a wide range of media including printmaking, sculpture, video and painting. Often incorporating archival material, Büttner’s exhibitions investigate shame, vulnerability and poverty. Using low media such as woodcuts or home videos, Büttner is interested in the role of the amateur in the production of culture.
For her solo exhibition On This Island at The University Art Galleries at UC Irvine’s Claire Trevor School of the Arts in California, and her participation in Documenta 14. The jury was impressed by the depth and maturity of Nashashibi’s work, which often examines sites of human occupation and the coded relationships that occur within those spaces – whether a family home or garden, a ship or the Gaza Strip. Her films use the camera as an eye to observe moments and events, contrasting reality with moments of fantasy and myth. They show how the intimate and everyday collide with issues of surveillance and control.
Photos By P C Robinson © Artlyst 2017
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