David Collins - local artist award $2,500 non acquisitive
Grace Cossington Smith art award $15, 000 acquisitive
Nadia Hernández
Nadia Hernández is a multidisciplinary artist. She was born in Mérida, Venezuela and lives and works in Sydney and studied at the Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane graduating with a Bachelor of Fine Arts (fashion) in 2008. Hernández explores her personal and political connections to Venezuala, connecting with memories and narratives that she articulates through her colours, shapes and textures and the poetry of her titles. In 2019 Hernández was awarded the Churchie National Emerging Art Prize and undertook a residency with Bundanon Trust, NSW. Hernández is represented by STATION.
Judges Katrina Cashman and Oliver Watts commented
Dulce de lechoza verde (procedimiento)/Green papaya sweet (procedure), is a beautiful textile work that harks back to Hernández heritage considering ideas of diaspora and food connecting culture and family. It is full of life, tenderness and is a very loving work that represents the connections we all need now.
Dulce de lechoza verde (procedimiento)/Green papaya sweet (procedure), 2021
cotton, linen, and corduroy on linen textile, 145 x 100 cm
Grace Cossington Smith early career artist award $2,500 non acquisitive Alice Wormald
Alice Wormald graduated in 2011 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Victorian College of the Arts in Melbourne. Wormald creates paintings that develop from a process of image collection and collage that she fragments and reinterprets. Her compositions are layered, combining a softness of brushmark and hard-edge linear patterns creating an illusion and play on visual perspective. Wormald is represented by Gallery 9, Sydney.
Judges Comment
Turning in Circles is a contemporary painting that revels in artifice, with her playing with and remaking of found images. It is a work full of contrasts – inside/outside, natural/artificial and a variety of interesting viewpoints.
Turning in Circles, 2020, oil on linen. 140 x 110 cm
Grace Cossington Smith local artist award $2,500 non acquisitive David Collins
David Collins' life on Dangar Island in the Hawkesbury River allows him to live with nature and connect fully with both the water and the land. He has a studio amongst the trees, overlooking the water, and frequently paints and draws en plein air. His view of the landscape with his broad washes of oil paint and calligraphic line ensure a personal and unique style. Collins studied fine arts at Hornsby Technical College and the Canberra School of Art. He has been the recipient of artist residencies in Australia and overseas and exhibits regularly. He is represented by Defiance Gallery.
Judges Comment
Hot Burn is an evocative, well observed landscape capturing a strong connection to place. Collins poetically responds to the land through colour, and beautiful glazes provide a sense of depth, heat and refracted light. Also revealed are suggestions of the devasting fires we so recently experienced.
Hot Burn, 2021, oil on Canvas, 122 X 200 cm (diptych)
Watch the announcement of the 2021 Grace Cossington Smith art award