Canada’s Sobey Art Award Radically Revamped for 2020
In place of naming a single winner of the CAD $100,000 prize, the longlist of 25 artists will all be awarded $25,000.
2019 Sobey Art Prize winner Stephanie Comilang. Courtesy the Sobey Art Foundation. Photo Credit Leory Schulz.
In response to COVID-19, major changes have been made to Canada's pre-eminent contemporary art prize for artists aged 40 or under.
Ordinarily, the CAD $100,000 Sobey Art Award is given to a winner at a gala following an exhibition of works by five shortlisted artists. This year, the exhibition and gala have both been cancelled, and there will be no one winner.
Instead, The Sobey Art Foundation and the National Gallery of Canada, who together administer the prize, will award $25,000 to each of the 25 longlisted artists.
Altogether, artists will receive $650,000 this year, compared to the usual $240,000 divided between the $100,000 first prize winner, four shortlisted artists who receive $25,000 each, and the remaining 20 longlisted artists, who receive $2,000 each.
'These extraordinary, historic, and challenging circumstances will have a profound impact on the livelihoods and practices of artists across Canada and around the world,' said Sobey Art Foundation Chair Rob Sobey. 'Our sincere wish is that this year's longlist artists will utilise this additional support to continue to do so.'
Last year's Sobey Art Award winner was Filipina-Canadian video artist Stephanie Comilang.
The full longlist of nominees follows below, arranged by region. —[O]
West Coast and Yukon
Michele Di Menna
Tsēmā Igharas
Carmen Papalia
Joseph Tisiga
Zadie Xa
Praries and North
asinnajaq
Jason de Haan
Luther Konadu
Amy Malbeuf
Freya Björg Olafson
Ontario
Bambitchell
Georgia Dickie
Jagdeep Raina
Catherine Telford Keogh
Quebec
Adam Basanta
Caroline Monnet
Sabrina Ratté
Atlantic
Jordan Bennett
Melanie Colosimo
Graeme Patterson
Lou Sheppard
D'Arcy Wilson