Pascal Leyder awarded 2023 Drawing Prize

Three artists from the international outsider scene were competing for the 16th edition of the Drawing Prize: Belgium artist Pascal Leyder, Iranian artist Mehrdad Rashidi and American artist Melvin way.

2023 a prize dedicated to outsider art
“It’s not simply a passing fancy. We have been looking at these artists who cultivate a sense of drawing, of line, and a need to communicate their vision of the world in a totally unique manner for a long time. […] This merges with our passion for drawing representing a primal gesture, completely magnified by these artists. It is often their principal means of expression, devoid of filters, and one may consider that the same intensity emanated from the art of prehistoric men…” (Extract from the interview by Marie Maertens).

Assembled in Paris on March 23 2023, the jury has awarded the 2023 Drawing Prize to Pascal Leyder born in 1988 in Bastogne (Belgium).

The award ceremony took place on the same day in the Salon du Dessin. The winner receives a prize of 15,000 EUR, whilst the other two artists each receive an endowment of 5,000 EUR. A work by the winner will be offered to to the Prints and Drawings Department of the national Museum of modern art by the Daniel & Florence Guerlain Foundation.   

Pascal Leyder is a visual artist originally from the town of Bastogne in the heart of the Belgium Ardenne region. In 2008, as he was just entering adulthood, he was offered a trial workshop at La “S” which, as it happened to be particularly successful, was followed by a proposition to participate to the workshops on a regular basis. His keen interest for illustration led him at once to undertake an intense production of drawings of which abundance is emphasized by his remarkable speed of execution and by his specificity to never adjust, correct nor go over his lines. The composition of Pascal Leyder’s artworks is generally characterized by the total use of the space of the paper, not at all worried with overload or excesses. It also reveals his taste for writing, words and signatures that he matter-of-factly affixes on almost every drawing.

His works are now in the collections of the Lam (Villeneuved’Ascq), the Museum Docteur Guislain (Ghent), the Museum of Everything (London), the Musée des Arts modestes (Sète), abcd (Montreuil) and the Bruno Decharme Donation at the Mnam-Centre Pompidou, Paris. His drawings frequently appear in collective comics and graphic magazines published, for example, by Le Dernier Cri and Frémok.

About the Daniel & Florence Guerlain Foundation’s Drawing Prize
This prize is reserved for French and foreign artists, whether they live in France or not, but who sustain a privileged cultural link with France, and for whom drawing constitutes a significant part of their work.

Awarded for the first time in 2007 and biennial until 2009, the Prize honours artists who make any unique work on paper, using graphic means: crayon, charcoal, red chalk, ink, wash tint, gouache, watercolour, pastels and felt… including collages and wall drawings but excluding computer and mechanical processes.

The candidates are selected by a committee composed of the two founders, Daniel and Florence Guerlain, and of six members chosen for their competence in contemporary art. Following a working meeting with the artists, visits to studios and analysis, the committee selects three artists whose work is presented to a jury that changes with each prize and chooses the winner.

2023 jury: Karin Dammann, Swiss, Gustavo Giacosa, Italian-Argentine, Kalle Levon, American, Giovanni Springmeier, German, Antoine de Galbert, Sébastien Lebrec, Laurence Poirel, Florence & Daniel Guerlain, French.

The prize receives the support of the Daniel & Florence Guerlain Foundation’s Cercle des Amis, la Maison Guerlain, la banque Neuflize OBC, Artcurial, Artprice by ArtMarket.com, Voisin Consulting Life Sciences, le Groupe Élysées Monceau, le Groupe Pasteur Mutualité, PatrimOne assurances, Arte Generali, le Salon du Dessin, Beaux-Arts de Paris, la Maison Ruinart.

Past winners: Silvia Bächli, Switzerland (2007), Sandra Vásquez de la Horra, Chile (2009), Catharina Van Eetvelde, Belgium (2010), Marcel Van Eeden, Netherlands (2011), Jorinde Voigt, Germany (2012), Susan Hefuna, Germany (2013), Tomasz Kowalski, Poland (2014), Jockum Nordström, Sweden (2015), Cameron Jamie, United States (2016), Ciprian Muresan, Romania (2017), Mamma Andersson, Sweden (2018), Claire Morgan, Irland (2019), Juan Uslé, Spain (2020), Françoise Pétrovitch, Fance (2021), Olga Chernysheva, Russia (2022).