Gold Coast City Art Gallery is delighted to host the inaugural Gold Coast Ulrick Schubert Photographic Art Award, the richest photography prize in Australia offering a $10,000 first prize. In its inaugural year the prize attracted 159 entries from photographers from all over Australia. The final selection of 47 for exhibition and judging features some of Australia’s most prominent contemporary photographers from every state in Australia.
Finalists vying for the $10,000 first prize include Rosemary Laing, Deborah Paauwe, Carl Warner, David Stephenson, Julie Rrap, Cherine Fahd, Adam Geczy, Shane Higson, Annie Hogan, Simon Cuthbert and Mark Kimber.
The 2002 Judge, Dr Isobel Crombie, Senior Curator Photography, National Gallery of Victoria conducted the pre-selection over two days and said, The Gold Coast Ulrick Schubert Photographic Art Award is an important new award that recognises the fact that photographs are amongst the most significant art works being produced in Australia today. There were over 450 photographs submitted to this award by over 159 individual photographers making this one of the largest photographic prizes in Australia.
Gallery Manager, John Walsh said This award will allow us to add significantly to our burgeoning collection of contemporary Australian photography. We are grateful to the Josephine Ulrick & Win Schubert Foundation for the Arts for providing us with the opportunity, not just to develop the collection, but also to present an important and dynamic exhibition to our visitors.
Dr Crombie added, What is evident from the range of work on display is the remarkable flexibility of contemporary photography: from straight documentary images to digital photography and photograms, the medium is undergoing a creative renaissance.
The Gold Coast Ulrick Schubert Photographic Art Award is now the richest prize offered for photography in Australia and will become an annual event on the Gold Coast City Art Gallery calendar.
For photographers this award represents a chance to have their work seen in a major regional art gallery while also giving us, as viewers, the rare opportunity to see the breadth and diversity of photographic work being produced around Australia, said Dr Crombie.
Josephine Ulrick was born June 17,1952 and died January 10,1997. She was a person possessed of many gifts. She was a writer and poet and an accomplished photographer. In addition, she loved and nurtured artistic talent in others. For the last three years of her life she was a director and curator of Art Galleries Schubert.
The Josephine Ulrick and Win Schubert Foundation for the Arts was set up by Win Schubert following the death of her friend with the specific purpose of continuing her friend’s involvement in the encouragement of talent in the creative arts. The Josephine Ulrick and Win Schubert Foundation for the Arts has been established to promote excellence in achievement in the creative arts, and to promote and further the interest of the general community in these arts by the awarding of prizes in poetry, photography and painting.
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