Art Fund Collect 2011
Aberdeen Art Gallery curator Kate Gillespie looks at Ritsue Mishima's 'Spin'
• Call for entries to curators wishing to boost public collections with international contemporary craft
• Craft critic Tanya Harrod joins judging panel
The Art Fund and the Crafts Council today launch for the fourth consecutive year Art Fund Collect, the £75,000 scheme offering UK curators the chance to buy an outstanding piece of contemporary international craft for their museum or gallery.
From 13 December 2010, curators from museums and galleries across the country are invited to apply to take part in the initiative.
Art Fund Collect will take place on 5 May 2011, the preview day of COLLECT, the Crafts Council’s international art fair for contemporary objects. For the third year running, the fair will be held at London’s Saatchi Gallery. Collect 2011 is open to the public from 6-9 May 2011.
Shortlisted curators are granted exclusive access to the fair, ahead of private buyers and VIPs and a day before doors open to the public. They have one hour to go around the 36 international galleries represented and pick one object they wish to add to their museum or gallery’s public collection. Curators then justify their selection to the Art Fund Collect judging panel before the winners are announced.
In 2011, for the first time, curators will have to present their choice in a spoken presentation to the judges. They will be required to explain why they have chosen their object and how it will boost existing collections at their museum or gallery. This reflects the Art Fund and Crafts Council’s aim to put curators and objects at centre stage of the scheme, and to develop curatorial expertise through the experiences of Art Fund Collect.
Winning curators and their objects are selected on the day, based on the vision and they demonstratein their choice of craft. Each one obtains a share of the £75,000 funding pot to buy their chosen object outright on behalf of their museum or gallery.
Curators have until 9 March 2011 to submit their applications. The shortlist, compiled by the judging panel, will be announced in late March.
Stephen Deuchar, Director of the Art Fund, said: “The Art Fund is all about bringing together people and art through museums and galleries, and through Art Fund Collect, where not only do curators acquire outstanding pieces for their collections and visitors, the process they go through is an important experience in itself. It develops skills of negotiation, presentation, and making the case for what they want to acquire – all of which are vital curatorial skills. And they do this within the context of meeting gallerists, exchanging ideas and forming new relationships and making new contacts within their field. We really look forward to the 2011 round of applications, and we especially encourage first-time applicants to take the plunge – it’s a fantastic and rewarding experience and there’s nothing to lose in having a go – and everything to gain!”
Rosy Greenlees, Executive Director of the Crafts Council, said: “The Crafts Council’s aim is to make the UK the best place to make, see, collect and learn about contemporary craft – and Art Fund Collect helps us to achieve this. The scheme is a central part of our professional development programme for curators and support for public as well as private collecting. By getting some of the best international craft into UK museums and galleries, collections are enhanced and visitors get to see and enjoy exceptional objects across the country. We are delighted this partnership with the Art Fund will make £75,000 available this year at Collect. This is in addition to the £200,000 that has already gone into collections since we launched the scheme in 2008. “
This year, Anthony Griffiths, Art Fund trustee and British Museum curator of Prints & Drawings, will chair the judging panel.
The Art Fund and Crafts Council are also delighted to welcome Tanya Harrod to the panel. She takes the helm from renowned ceramicist and writer Edmund de Waal, who took part in 2010. Tanya Harrod is the author of the prize-winning The Crafts in Britain in the Twentieth Century (Yale University Press 1999). She has organised many exhibitions and contributes regularly to The Burlington Magazine, The Spectator, Crafts and The Times Literary Supplement. With Glenn Adamson and Edward S Cooke she is the editor The Journal of Modern Craft.
Tanya Harrod said: “The Art Fund and the Crafts Council are making it possible for our museums to acquire some of the most ambitious, mysterious and beautiful objects of our time. This is timely when ideas about craft and craftsmanship have never been more discussed.”
The other judges are: Art Fund Director Stephen Deuchar, Ex Chairman of the Crafts Council and The Art Fund Sir Nicholas Goodison, Executive Director of the Crafts Council Rosy Greenlees and Art Fund Trustee Jonathan Marsden.
Art Fund Collect was set up jointly by the Art Fund and the Crafts Council in 2008 as a way of boosting public collections with contemporary craft.
In 2010, five curators won an object for their public collections at Art Fund Collect. The winners were: Aberdeen Art Gallery; the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford; the Royal Albert Memorial Museum & Art Gallery, Exeter; Shipley Art Gallery, Gateshead; and the Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester. A total of eleven museums and galleries were shortlisted, out of a total of 21 applicants.
For more information and to apply for Art Fund Collect 2011, visit www.artfund.org/artfundcollect
Notes to Editors
COLLECT: the international art fair for contemporary objects, Saatchi Gallery, 6-9 May
2011 COLLECT is one of the most important annual fairs for contemporary craft in Europe, presented by the Crafts Council, showcasing work by 400 artists represented by 36 international galleries. Visit www.craftscouncil.org.uk/collect
The Art Fund is the national fundraising charity for works of art and plays a major part in enriching the range, quality and understanding of art in the UK. It campaigns, fundraises and gives money to museums and galleries to buy and show art, and promotes its enjoyment through its events and membership scheme. Current initiatives include sponsoring the UK tour of the ARTIST ROOMS collection, and running a major campaign in partnership with the National Trust to raise £2.7 million to save Brueghel’s The Procession to Calvary for Nostell Priory. The Art Fund is funded by its art-loving and museum-going members and supporters who believe that great art should be for everyone to enjoy. Find out more at www.artfund.org. Press contact | 020 7225 4888 | media@artfund.org
The Crafts Council’s goal is to make the UK the best place to make, see, collect and learn about contemporary craft.
• We believe that craft plays a dynamic and vigorous role in the UK’s social, economic and cultural life.
• We believe that everyone should have the opportunity to make, see, collect and learn about craft.
• We believe that the strength of craft lies in its use of traditional and contemporary techniques, ideas and materials to make extraordinary new work.
• We believe that the future of craft lies in nurturing talent; children and young people must be able to learn about craft at school and have access to excellent teaching throughout their education.
• 12% of the UK population visited a craft exhibition in 2009/10, and 18% participated in craft activity in the same year (DCMS/ACE Taking Part data update August 2010). Taking Part is an ongoing survey being carried out by Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) and Arts Council England (ACE)
• More than 2.8 million visits were made to the Crafts Council website in 2009. To find out everything you need to know about where to make, see, collect and learn about contemporary craft visit www.craftscouncil.org.uk
• The Crafts Council is supported by Arts Council England. Arts Council England works to get great art to everyone by championing, developing and investing in artistic experiences that enrich people’s lives.
Tanya Harrod trained as an art historian. She is the author of the prize-winning The Crafts in Britain in the Twentieth Century (Yale University Press 1999). She has organised many exhibitions and contributes regularly to The Burlington Magazine, The Spectator, Crafts and The Times Literary Supplement. She is writing a biography of the potter Michael Cardew for Yale University Press and is researching a broadly-based study of the meaning of the handmade for Reaktion Books. Her current interests include the vernacular in relation to modernism, art education in sub-Saharan Africa in the colonial period, notions of wealth and poverty in early twentieth century Britain and the effect of the New Media on the applied arts. She is on the Advisory Panel of the Journal of Design History, of The Burlington Magazine and of Interpreting Ceramics and is Advisor to the Craft Lives Project based at the National Sound Archive of the British Library. With Glenn Adamson and Edward S Cooke she is the editor The Journal of Modern Craft.
