Video, film-inspired artists dominate Turner Prize shortlist

[May 07, 2014] By Michael Roddy

LONDON (Reuters) — Artists who work with film, video, recorded sound and photographs took all four slots on the shortlist announced on Wednesday for the 2014 Turner Prize, one of the annual high points of the British art calendar.

The prize, in its 30th year and given previously to such figures of the British art world as Damien Hirst, Anish Kapoor, and Gilbert and George, carries a 100,000-pound prize. The winner will be announced in December.

Penelope Curtis, director of the Tate Britain museum and chair of the jury, said it was not the first time that no traditional painters or sculptors had made the short list.

"That's happened a number of times," she said at a press conference announcing the shortlist for the prize, which is run by the Tate museums organisation.

"I think there's been a number of times when there's been quite a fix on video in the last 10-12 years. I mean that's just the way artists work now," she said.
 

Nominees Duncan Campbell, who was born in Ireland and now lives and works in Glasgow, James Richards of Wales and Tris Vonna-Michell of England all use film and other recorded media in their work. Ciara Phillips, a Canadian living in Scotland, works with screenprints, textiles, photographs and wall paintings, a press statement said.

Two of the artists, Campbell and Richards, have had exhibitions mounted at the Venice Biennale. Vonna-Michell had a solo exhibition in Brussels and Phillips had a solo exhibition in London.

"The shortlist includes work that manipulates and appropriates found film footage and online imagery, as well as work that employs analogue technology, craft and design," a statement by the Tate said. "These contrasting approaches suggest the impact of the Internet, cinema, TV and mobile technologies on a new generation of artists."

Curtis, in a statement, said: "This year's nominations illustrate the mobility of the contemporary art world, in which works are seen at global biennales and festivals over the course of the year.

"The four shortlisted artists share a strong international presence and an ability to adapt, restage and reinterpret their own and others' works, very often working in a collaborative social context."

The prize is open to a British artist under the age of 50.

(Reporting by Michael Roddy; Editing by Larry King)
 

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