Duane Linklater wins the 2013 Sobey Art Award
The Curatorial Panel for the 2013 Sobey Art Award announced today that Duane Linklater of Ontario is the recipient of the 50,000 CAD award.
The announcement was made this evening during a gala event held at the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia in Halifax hosted by Marc Mayer, Director of the National Gallery of Canada.
The Award was presented to the winning artist by the 2012 Sobey winner, Raphaëlle de Groot.
Duane Linklater was chosen from a shortlist that included:
Tamara Henderson
Pascal Grandmaison
Mark Clintberg
Isabelle Pauwels
Each of these outstanding artists receives 5,000 CAD in prize money from the Sobey Art Foundation.
In commenting on Linklater’s achievement, the Curatorial Panel said:
“We are delighted to announce Duane Linklater as the winner of the 2013 Sobey Art Award. Linklater has the distinct ability to articulate new measurements for authorship and histories. His positive and generous approach to art-making creates space for collaboration and audience engagement. Linklater actively investigates the authority of language and pushes its boundaries. His practice simultaneously engages with wild, rural, urban, and digital realms, offering refreshing positions on contemporary life. This allows for new perspectives within Indigenous cultural production, yet it is Linklater’s broad relevance to contemporary national and international art that is of great value here.”
The 2013 Sobey Art Award Curatorial Panel consists of:
–Mireille Eagan, Curator of Canadian Art, The Rooms Provincial Art Gallery
–Marie-Claude Landry, Curator of Contemporary Art, Musée d’art de Joliette
–Melissa Bennett, Curator of Contemporary Art, Art Gallery of Hamilton
–Jesse McKee, Curator, Walter Phillips Gallery, The Banff Centre
–Charo Neville, Curator, Kamloops Art Gallery
Since the inception of the Sobey Art Award in 2002, the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia has organized and administered both the Award and its accompanying exhibition. Every other year, the Award travels to a gallery or museum outside of Halifax.
The 2013 Sobey Art Award shortlist exhibition is on view at the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia until January 5, 2014.
About Duane Linklater
Duane Linklater is Omaskêko Cree, from Moose Cree First Nation in Northern Ontario and is currently based in North Bay, Ontario. He was educated at the University of Alberta, receiving a Bachelor of Native Studies and a Bachelor of Fine Arts. Linklater attended the Milton Avery Graduate School of Arts at Bard College in upstate New York, completing his Master of Fine Arts in Film and Video. Linklater produces a range of work including video and film installation, performance, sculptural objects, and often works within the contexts of cooperative and collaborative gestures. He has exhibited and screened his work nationally and internationally at the Vancouver Art Gallery, Art Gallery of Alberta, Family Business Gallery in New York, at the Power Plant in Toronto, and the Thunder Bay Art Gallery. His collaborative film project with Brian Jungen, Modest Livelihood, was originally presented at the Walter Phillips Gallery at The Banff Centre in collaboration with dOCUMENTA (13) and subsequently travelled to the Reva and David Logan Centre Gallery at the University of Chicago and Catriona Jeffries Gallery in Vancouver. Linklater recently presented Learning, a solo exhibition organized by Althea Thauberger at Susan Hobbs Gallery in Toronto.
About the Sobey Art Award
The Sobey Art Award, Canada’s pre-eminent award for contemporary art, was created in 2002 by the Sobey Art Foundation. It is an annual prize given to an artist of age 40 or under who has exhibited in a public or commercial art gallery within 18 months of being nominated. A total of 70,000 CAD in prize money is awarded annually; 50,000 CAD to the winner and 5,000 CAD to the other four finalists. For information: www.sobeyartaward.ca
Previous winners are: Raphaëlle de Groot (2012), Daniel Young and Christian Giroux (2011), Daniel Barrow (2010), David Altmejd (2009), Tim Lee (2008), Michel de Broin (2007), Annie Pootoogook (2006), Jean-Pierre Gauthier (2004) and Brian Jungen (2002).
Art Gallery of Nova Scotia
The Art Gallery of Nova Scotia is the largest art museum in Atlantic Canada, with a mission to engage people with art. With locations in downtown Halifax and Yarmouth, the Gallery houses the Province’s art collection and offers a range of exceptional exhibitions, education and public programming. For information: www.artgalleryofnovascotia.ca
Media contacts:
Bernard Doucet, Director of Corporate Affairs, Sobeys Inc.
T +1 902 921 1755 / bernard.doucet [at] sobeys.com
Leslie Tinkham, MPA, Director of Development, Art Gallery of Nova Scotia
T +1 902 424 0073 / M +1 902 266 9285 / tinkhale [at] gov.ns.ca
