The City of Hobart Art Prize 2005 Exhibition
Ceramics / Painting
Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery , Macquarie Street Hobart
Saturday 4 June - Sunday 31 July 2005
The 2005 City of Hobart Art Prize exhibition was opened by the Lord Mayor of Hobart, Alderman Rob Valentine at the Tasmanian Museuem and Art Gallery on the evening of Friday 3 June 2005.
At the official opening the winners of the two $7,500 acquisitive prizes and the $4,000 acquisitive Moorilla Winter Collection - Tasmania Prize were announced.
To view the 2005 City of Hobart Art Prize Exhibition Catalogue
Prize Winners
The City of Hobart Art Prize: Ceramics
Fiona Murphy
Oviform (do birds like to sing and plants like to flower) 2003 - 2005
Artist Statement
"Forms from a varitety of natural sources are amalgamated into each sculptured work. There is a search for a visual poetry through the interaction of a group of works. A narrative unfolds as the links are made between the forms... the quiet in contrast to the spining, light with shade, positive form with active negative space, growth to decay, concave to convex."
The City of Hobart Art Prize: Painting
Merrin Eirth
Rush (sugarblush) 2004
Artist Statement
"Summarised in Dr. Karen Burns' essay "Naure Morte and Poisonous Aesthetics", my strategy for this painting was to: ".....investigate a contemporary world of delirious, hysterical chemistry and narcosis and then offer an antidote of visual order, formal coherence and lateral connection, a place where the matter of painting ingests the problematic world and holds the two in a loving and deadly embrace, where surface promises are accompanied by vicious dissection."
Moorilla Winter Collection - Tasmania Prize
Penny Smith
Strangefruit Suite
Artist Statement
"The title of this work loosely refers to the themes in the song of the same name made famous by Billie Holiday in 1939. Through the use of abstract shape, reference to the vessel, black and white and the use of text - this work alludes to notions of displacement and difference-to opposite-to the exotic misplaced."
Judges Commendation: Ceramics
Gail Nichols
Jar 2004
Artist Statement
"The subtle interplay of technique, materials and aesthetics is an essential part of my art practice. Research into materials and firing dynamics has led me to a new vapour glaze aesthetic, in which the lush dimpled surface interacts with and softens the form. The work invites tactile as well as visula responses. The ceramic vessel is intriguing in its deceptive simplicity , invoking a quiet yet powerful sculptural presence."
Judges Commendation: Painting
Patrick Grieve
East Sassafras number 3 2005
Artist Statement
"This work had its origin two years ago when I started to resolve a consistent tension in my approach to depicting a sense of place. I have always been deeply influenced by the physical nature of paint and methods of application. For years those formal aspects of painting dominated my work, pushing to the background a deep urge to express the landscape that has been part of me since childhood."
Judging Panel
The members of the Judging Panel for the 2005 City of Hobart Art Prize were:
- Robert Bell, Senior Curator, International and Australian Decorative Arts and Design, Australian National Gallery;
- Stephen Rainbird, Senior Curator and Arts Adviser, Queensland University Gallery;
- Bala Starr, Curator, Ian Potter Museum, University of Melbourne, and
- Peter Hughes, Curator of Decorative Arts, Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery.