Wander the Meijer Gardens to see Alesxander Liberman's Aria and other eye-catching works. A JJ photo
Grand Rapids, MI, home to the world-class Frederik Meijer Gardens and Sculpture Park, is making waves in the art world with ArtPrize, arguably the world’s largest art award competition.
Aimed at bringing the works of international and national artists to Grand Rapids this fall, the competition will award $449,000 to 10 entrants.
The winner receives $250,000 followed by $100,000 to second place and $50,000 to third. The remaining seven runners-up receive $7,000 each.
The chance to showcase their art and snag a remunerative prize attracted more than 500 artists from as far as Israel and Ecuador, New York and California by a July 31 deadline.
Their works, which range from mixed media and sculpture to video and performance art, will spread across three square miles of downtown Grand Rapids, Sept. 23 through Oct. 10. Winners will be announced Oct. 8. Voting the first week of the event determines who makes it to the finals the second week.
Who decides? The viewers do. In this age of I-Phones and Blackberries, voting will be through text messaging and at a website. Voters must first register for an ID in person at the event to cast their choice.
To people who question whether the public instead of curators and art critics should have the final say, ArtPrize creator Rick DeVos, Grand Rapids, explained this competition is different.
“The event is about conversation. I want to get people talking about art forms and make contact with the artists,” DeVos said.
An appreciator of the visual and cultural expressions aired at Sundance and other noted film festivals, DeVos first considered film but concluded that venues would limit the entries and that the event might merely copy other festivals.
“I wanted to do something that is different and totally open, something that embraces all different types of expressions and venues,” he said.
“Voting is a means to an end. That end is to get people out in the street, to come here and see places they’ve not seen before. I want people to react to it,” DeVos said.
What: ArtPrize
When: Sept. 23-Oct.10
Where: Downtown Grand Rapids, MI
For more info: go to VisitGrandRapids.org, call 877- VISIT GR (877-847-4847) or go to artprize.org
Comments
I am a LA based assemblage artist showing, When Children Are Present, at ArtPrize this September and so excited to be part of such a wonderful city-wide art appreciation. Thanks for the coverage!
Cynthia
www.cynthia-rogers.com
I'll look for your work Cynthia. Have to go there during ArtPrize.
Not sure what meijer gardens has to do with this article at all? Me too.
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