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The jury for the Preis der Nationalgalerie fьr Junge Kunst (The National Gallery Prize for Youth Art) awarded by the Verein der Freunde der Nationalgalerie (The Friends of the National Gallery) has proudly announced the names of four candidates short-listed for the 2011 award.
Introduced in 2000, the prize which totals euro 50.000 is seen as Germany’s most prestigious and coveted award for young artists. The candidates, who have already made a name for themselves on the international scene, all currently live and work in Berlin. The nominees were chosen after a meticulous selection process, whittling down to four a long list of artists submitted to the panel by international curators and museum directors.
Cyprien Gaillard, born in France, describes his works as “contemporary architecture in ruins”. His video pieces and photography are filled with moments of picturesque tranquillity threatened by inevitable destruction, including collapsing buildings, nature under threat and urban structures in a state of entropy. His work captures the inevitable fate of everything man-made – to lie in ruins amongst the detritus of civilization.
Artist Kitty Kraus, the winner of the 2008 Blauorange Art Prize, focuses on transitions from one state to another, on effacement, and on collapse. She draws upon the heritage of the avant-garde movement, emphasising the medium itself in her sculptures and installations. Using glass, ice, light, fabric and mirrors, she reduces objects to their most basic of forms. The basic qualities of the media are emphasized: the transparency of glass, the ephemeral nature of light, the flowing movement of liquids. Her works verge on the minimalist; almost invisible, her work’s sheer presence somehow transforms the spaces that host her installations. Most of her installations are reduced to fragile, austere geometric forms enhanced by light and threatened with imminent deconstruction.
The works of nominee, Clara Lidйn – also a winner of the Blauorange in 2010 – are imbued with social criticism and subversion. Her installations verge on the claustrophobic with her performances and video work disturbing the viewer, provoking feelings of unease, shock, and precariousness. Her controversial videos, in which she frequently acts, discuss behaviour and attitudes that challenge conventional norms, questioning widely accepted virtues and redefining the border between the normal and the abnormal. Her work “Paralysed” sees her dancing unrestrained in front of passengers on a train; another piece sees her riding a bicycle within an enclosed space – smashing it to pieces in the process. Her works are carefully staged and documented protests – revealing a profound despair which seeks to provoke outrage at the glaring contradictions in private and social life.
Andro Wekua, born in Sokhumi, Georgia and currently living in Berlin, introduces the spectator into a precarious, introspective, yet carefully staged world of his own through his paintings, installations and collages. His imagery is charged with multiple meanings that are obvious perhaps only to the artist himself. At times very personal, his art, based on individual symbolism and memories, emphasises profound melancholy and disillusionment which cannot leave the viewer impartial to his work. Wekua has seen his work on display at the prestigious Gladstone Gallery, New York. In 2010, his solo exhibition entitled Gott ist tot aber das Mдdchen nicht (God is dead but not the girl) was staged to critical acclaim at the Schinkel Pavillon in Berlin. He, alongside other young artists, has also taken part in Biennales in Gwangju (South Korea), Berlin and Prague. He has also brought his work to his homeland – in 2007, alongside Kitty Kraus he participated in the “Tbilisi 4: Everyday is Saturday” exhibition curated by Daniel Baumann.
The four nominees will contribute works to a special exhibition for the competition which is planned for September 2011, at the Hamburger Bahnhof Museum for Contemporary Art in Berlin. The ultimate winner of the Prize will be decided by a two further panels of juries, with the award being presented at a ceremony at the Hamburger Bahnhof Museum on September 27, 2011.
Editor’s Note: Lily Khositashvili is a professor at the Humblodt University Berlin, Faculty of Cultural Studies