13.10.08
Midas Award 2008: Winner of Cornwall’s contemporary art award announced
 Carnivalesque canvases, Jesse James’ treasure chest, charcoal cats and birds, and drawings inspired by the Russian Revolution were just some of the imaginative pieces that had been short-listed for the Midas Award 2008, the unanimous winner of which was announced as George Morgan at Newlyn Art Gallery on Friday evening.
Initially established three years ago by Artonomy Fine Art and property services company, Midas in conjunction with University College Falmouth (UCF) as a means of helping the most talented of Cornwall’s emerging artists to launch their professional careers and reach new audiences, the coveted prize offers one UCF graduate a funded studio space at Krowji, the cluster of creative studios, workspaces and offices based at the former Grammar School in Redruth, and professional development support from UCF’s Business Fellow in Visual Arts, Sara Bowler and Creative Skills.
The seven semi-finalists – Matt Ayling, Chantal Brooks, Craig Dixon, Richard Drury, Lise Hovesen, George Morgan and Charlotte Williams, whose work will be on show to the public at Newlyn Art Gallery from 11 October to 1 November – were selected by an expert panel of judges during UCF’s annual graduate show in June.
The judges were Newlyn Art Gallery’s Exhibition Manager, Blair Todd; UCF’s former Director of Art, Jeff Hellyer and Business Development Manager, Martin Walton along with Project Director, Keith Hosen from Midas.
New work by last year’s winner, Amy Albright, created during her 12-month tenureship at Krowji, is also featured as part of the exhibition in the downstairs gallery.
The top prize was awarded to George Morgan by Executive Director of Midas, Murdo Mace, for his paintings, inspired by an interest in the sky, that were redolent of a bygone age.
“We are always delighted with the high standard of work produced by UCF’s BA(Hons) Fine Art graduates and this year is no exception,” said Martin Walton. “The combination of exceptional quality and increased exhibition space offered by our new host at Newlyn enabled the judges to increase the number of finalists from four to seven.”
“The Midas Award has allowed the Newlyn Art Gallery the opportunity to further its links with UCF and give emerging artists exposure to a wider audience at this stage of their career,” added Blair Todd. “It has been incredibly rewarding working with the seven artists to bring their artwork together into this group show, which has revealed fascinating relationships between very different practices. Midas Award 2008 is an exceptionally strong exhibition that we are proud to present.”
“The Midas Award is a prestigious event in Cornwall’s arts calendar,” commented University College Falmouth’s Rector, Professor Alan Livingston. “By supporting emerging talent, Midas is investing in fine art in the truest sense. The award provides a newly-established artist with the practical support they need to build not just a viable career, but one that contributes to Cornwall’s creative economy and raises the national profile of the county. We also extend our thanks to NewlynArtGallery, Krowji and Creative Skills”.
“We are delighted to be involved in supporting young, creative talent and congratulate GeorgeMorgan on his success,” concluded Executive Director of Midas, Murdo Mace. “The creative industries are as important to the future of Cornwall as the physical regeneration that the county continues to experience, and it is an honour for Midas to play its part.”
“I feel privileged to be exhibiting my work in such an amazing and beautiful gallery space, and was really not expecting this,” said George Morgan of his win. “I am absolutely going to make the most of this opportunity, which is exactly what my career needed.”
For further information please contact Jilly Easterby, Head of Public Affairs at University College Falmouth on tel: 01326 213792 or Tiffany Hardie-Evans, Head of Communications at Midas on tel: 0117 305 2116.
The Objective One Programme for Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly has invested in the Combined Universities in Cornwall (CUC) project, both Phase 1 and Phase 2, through the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and the European Social Fund (ESF). University College Falmouth is a partner of the CUC.
Editor's notes:
THE WINNER WAS:
George Morgan
born 1987, Oxford
"My work is informed by the intangible: by dreams, by vague, distorted memories of places and experiences. I also take inspiration from imagery found in books, newspapers and photographs. At the moment, one of my big interests is the sky, and all the creatures and craft with the faculty to take to it. We humans and creatures are almost always entirely exposed to each other’s watchful gaze, even when we think we are within the privacy and shelter of our homes. Yet there is such a distinct unease in the notion of being watched, unaware, from somewhere afar.”
Exhibitions:
2008 – Midas Award 2008, Newlyn Art Gallery, Cornwall
2008 – Affordable Arts Fair, Battersea Park, London
2008 – Fleet, The Electrician’s Shop, Trinity Buoy Wharf, London
2008 – Degree Show, University College Falmouth, Cornwall
www.georgemorgan.info
THE SIX SEMI-FINALISTS WERE:
Matt Ayling
born 1984, Surrey
“Painting, for me, is about image making, and by that I mean a kind of inventing of the image in paint. So it is about what paint can do, how the physical properties of paint can lend themselves to this process of creation. The images are reconstructed through drawing and collage, so the paintings rarely represent the photographic source(s) I have worked from.”
Exhibitions:
2008 – Midas Award 2008, Newlyn Art Gallery, Cornwall
2008 – Fleet, The Electrician’s Shop, Trinity Buoy Wharf, London
2008 – Degree Show, University College Falmouth, Cornwall
2007 – To Let, Temporary Space, Surrey
www.MattAyling.com
Chantal Brooks
born 1964, Redruth
“What motives me is a genuine interest in life, and where we place ourselves within this experience and what we experience by choice or accident or fate. My work acts as evidence of the philosophical process of how we react emotionally to these occurrences, that make us who we are, and the complexities of being human, of being both strong and fragile at a given moment. You have the opportunity to use all of your senses within an installation, sound and smell brings the viewer personal associations and memory, which add another dimension. With this comes the time that the audience spends walking around and through a piece of work, so the experience is very physical.”
www.chantalbrooks.co.uk
Craig Dixon
born 1985, Surrey
For his current exhibition at Newlyn Art Gallery, Dixon has selected from a series of paintings completed during the final year of his degree. Dixon is motivated by study and the pursuit of perfecting his own visual language and becoming fluent in it. The selected pieces show a clear learning-inspired and evolving process through the behaviour of the artist’s brushwork, medium and technique.
Exhibitions:
2008 – Midas Award 2008, Newlyn Art Gallery, Cornwall
2008 – Degree Show, University College Falmouth, Cornwall
2007 – Smashed by the Looking Glass, or Kommienezuepadt, Strange Cargo Gallery, Kent
2007 – Shortlisted for New Contemporaries
2005 – The Venice Gallery, Venice
www.craigdixon.org
Dickon Drury
born 1986, Salisbury
Dickon Drury is currently living and working in Bristol as part of a three-month residency at Spike Island. Showing his current body of work at Newlyn Art Gallery, he presents two large-scale paintings alongside an array of painted objects. Taking inspiration from folk art and a childhood of craft and DIY toys, Drury’s playful way of working lends itself to the sprawling installation displayed as part of Midas Award 2008.
Exhibitions:
2008 – Residency at Spike Island, Bristol
2008 – Degree Show, University College Falmouth, Cornwall
2007- Shortlisted Mercury Art Prize/Finalist Exhibition, Hospital Gallery, Covent Garden, London
2007 – Grape Lady Falls, Falmouth
www.dickondruryblogspot.com
Lise Hovesen
born 1985, Susa, Denmark
Drawings and objects are juxtaposed as a semi-fictional anthropological archive, part museum exhibit, part professor’s study, and part schoolroom, offering a ‘collective education’. The antiquated appearance of the work offers a seductive way in for the spectator, who is then forced to reconsider some aspect of the present in relation to the past. History is indeed cyclical, and we are faced with the re-adoption of nuclear power by governments and prolonged conflict with Russia, with its history so embedded in folklore, that it has often been hard to distinguish fiction from reality.
Exhibitions:
2008 – Degree Show, University College Falmouth, Cornwall
www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/yourgallery/artist_profile//91889.html
Charlotte Williams
born 1985, Truro
Williams’ paintings focus on the idea of travel and what we observe, benefiting from her own experiences of travelling across Europe. She is inspired by both historic and contemporary artists, including Mark Rothko, Richard Serra and Agnes Martin. Her strong interest in architecture and culture is reflected in her work, one of her favourite buildings being Kiasma Gallery of Art & Architecture by Steven Holl in Helsinki. Williams is very passionate about her practice and believes that the progression of her concepts and work contributes to who she is as a person.
www.charlottewilliamsart.com
About the winner of Midas Award 2007, Amy Albright
born 1985, Plymouth
“I have developed a visual language that alludes to the interconnecting natural forms and patterns that surround us. I am interested in the relationship between the macro and microscopic as well as almost unnoticed, minute marks and traces. This series of work has been particularly inspired by fossil and wood grain patterns; as well as underwater images, focusing on the effects of light through water. My painting process is organic, imitating nature's ephemeral flux, allowing and capturing elements of chance; I work intuitively responding to previous marks. The painterly language I have created derives from many sources; meteorological, astronomical, satellite and microscopic imagery as well as my own first-hand photographs. I am trying to trap the intangible and unsettle the viewers’ sense of scale. On the verge between figuration and abstraction, my aim is to communicate a sensitive, intimate view of nature’s constant flux, for the paintings to be ambiguous, giving clues but not completion.”
Exhibitions:
January 2008 – Mixed show, Artonomy Fine Art, Truro, Cornwall
December 2007 – Drawing exhibition, Surface Gallery, Nottingham
October 2007 – The Midas Award 2007 finalist exhibition, Artonomy Fine art, Truro, Cornwall
September 2007 – Selected for group show, The St Ives Society of Artists as part of the St Ives September Festival
June 2007 – Sunrise with Seamonsters, Trinity Buoy Wharf, London
June 2007 – Degree Show, University College Falmouth, Cornwall
October 2006 – All Cornish group show, Kingfisher Gallery, Sidbury, Devon
Awards:
October 2007 – Winner, Midas Award 2007
June 2007 – Selected for the Creative Skills Graduate mentoring scheme, mentored by Naomi Frears
About University College Falmouth
University College Falmouth is internationally respected for the quality of its undergraduate and postgraduate courses in Art, Design and Media, and has a long and distinguished history of fine art practice.
In April 2008, University College Falmouth merged with Dartington College of Arts to create a new institution focusing on the expansion of Falmouth’s expertise in Art, Design and Media and Dartington’s expertise in Choreography, Music, Theatre, Art and Writing.
The merger paves the way for the creation of Arts University Cornwall in 2012, creating a specialist Higher Education institution unique to the South West.
The College currently has c3000 students and three campuses: Woodlane in Falmouth; Tremough in Penryn, which it jointly manages with the University of Exeter in a collaboration that is unique in the UK – and Dartington in Totnes. Dartington Campus staff and students will relocate to brand new, purpose-built facilities at Tremough in 2010.
University College Falmouth is a founding partner in the Combined Universities in Cornwall (CUC), a unique initiative to promote regional economic regeneration through higher education. The CUC is funded mainly by the European Union (Objective One), the South West Regional Development Agency, and the Higher Education Funding Council for England, with support from Cornwall County Council.
www.falmouth.ac.uk
About Midas
Midas is one of the UK’s fastest-growing, independent providers of property solutions, and has 30 years’ experience offering a complete range of construction and property-related services for all industry sectors.
The Midas Group is made up of specialist trading companies and dedicated consumer teams that deliver a highly personalised service. Midas works closely with clients and partners to develop open, long-term relationships and deliver high-quality, value-for-money projects on time, ensuring that customers have a positive experience and their expectations are exceeded.
www.midasgroup.co.uk
About Newlyn Art Gallery
Newlyn Art Gallery has a 112-year history of developing regionally-significant contemporary art projects. Over the past 20 years the level of ambition within the organisation has increased very significantly, to the point where the gallery consistently delivers nationally-significant programmes of exhibitions and education projects.
The gallery was previously limited by its building, necessitating a redevelopment in order to realise its plans to showcase the very best of national and international contemporary art. The newly-refurbished gallery reopened on 7 July 2007, alongside a major new art space, The Exchange, in the heart of Penzance.
For more information, please contact:
James Green, Director
Newlyn Art Gallery
New Road, Newlyn, TR18 5PZ
Telephone: 01736 363715
Email: mail@newlynartgallery.co.uk
About Krowji
Krowji is the cluster of creative studios, workspaces and offices based at the former Grammar School in Redruth. The site was acquired in 2005 and there are now more than 80 people, including painters, furniture makers, jewellers, web designers, picture framers, theatre companies and ceramicists as well as office staff from a number of sector support agencies such as Creative Skills and the County Council’s Creative Unit. There are meeting rooms, a licensed café, exhibition areas and a rehearsal space.
The vision is to develop the site into a focus for Cornwall’s vibrant creative sector and to contribute to the regeneration of Redruth. They have been working with local rchitects Workhousedesign from Truro, who were chosen following a national competitive selection process and have recently submitted a formal planning application for a major expansion of the facilities on site with the aim of providing space for some 250 people by 2011.
The scheme is being developed in partnership with the local authorities, CPR Regeneration and the SW Regional Development Agency. They have very close links with University College Falmouth and are delighted to be a joint sponsor of the scheme for another year.
The name Krowji comes from the Cornish language word for shed or small workspace.
For more information please contact:
Ross Williams, Director
Krowji Ltd, The Old Grammar School, West Park, Redruth TR15 3AJ
Telephone: 01209 313200/07779 467640
Email: ross@actcornwall.org.uk
About Creative Skills
Creative Skills is the professional development agency for practitioners working in the creative industries in Cornwall. Their aim is to equip creative practitioners in Cornwall with the skills, knowledge and opportunities they need to develop and share their creativity, and increase their prosperity. Creative skills is funded by the Learning and Skills Council and Objective One, and supports professional development through structured support and training for those who work in the creative industries in Cornwall.
www.creativeskills.org.uk
Clare Morgan
Media Relations Manager
The Partnership Office
Castle House
Pydar Street
Truro TR1 2UD
Mobile: 07973 813647
Telephone: 01872 223439
cmorgan@cornwall.gov.uk
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