11 Mar 2011

AICA-USA Awards ceremony on March 14 in NY

ANNUAL ARTS AWARDS TO HONOR ARTISTS, MUSEUMS & CURATORS

U. S. ART CRITICS ASSOCIATION (AICA-USA) ANNOUNCES AWARD CEREMONY

The annual AICA awards ceremony, a fixture of the American art world for more than 25 years, will take place this year at a new venue, The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, on March 14 at 6 PM. For the first time, the awards will be presented by former AICA honorees, including Shirin Neshat, Martin Puryear, Christo and Linda Nochlin, and the ceremony will include video performances by Kimsooja and William Kentridge. Many artists, including Marina Abramović and Cai Guo-Qiang, will accompany the curators of their shows as they accept their awards in person. Elizabeth C. Baker, the former editor of Art in America, will receive a special Lifetime Achievement award for her distinguished contribution to the field of criticism. A select number of seats will be available to the public. Please contact aicausaprogram@gmail.com for more information.


FEBRUARY 25, 2011 – NEW YORK

'Their awards may not have the glitz of Rob Pruitt's Art Awards, but the U.S. chapter of the International Association of Art Critics (AICA) has stamina. It has presented annual prizes for over 25 years. . . . While Pruitt's awards celebrate art-world personalities, AICA focuses on exhibitions.'
Stephanie Cash, Art in America


The 26 winners of first and second places in twelve categories, selected from over one hundred finalists, include exhibitions focusing on the contemporary artists Marina Abramović, Tino Sehgal and Cai Guo-Qiang, the mid 20th century artists Arshile Gorky and Yves Klein and the 19th-century and early 20th century masters Henri Matisse, Otto Dix and Claude Monet. Honors will also go to thematic exhibitions dealing with the presence of women artists in Pop art, the history of performance art, and the Bauhaus.

'This year's AICA Awards reflect a truly national, as well as an international character of the artistic scene in the United States. We are very pleased that our members have acknowledged dynamic versatility of our artistic scene in such a spectacular fashion,' says AICA-USA's President Marek Bartelik. Eleanor Heartney, Chair of the Nominating Committee, stressed this year's wide range of winning institutions, from major museums to small not for profits and innovative spaces.

After learning that 'Leon Golub: Live & Die Like a Lion?' had been named Best Show in a Non-Profit Gallery or Space, Brett Littman, the executive director of The Drawing Center, who curated the show, said: 'It is a tremendous honor for The Drawing Center to be recognized for the excellence of our programming by AICA for the third year in a row…I am very proud that The Drawing Center can develop intelligent and impactful exhibitions that garner the accolades of our peers.'

Here's how Deborah Landau, President of Madison Square Park Conservancy, responded to the news that 'Antony Gormley: Event Horizon,' which she organized, had won a prize in Best Project in a Public Space: 'We are so honored to join the ranks of such prestigious institutions as the Museum of Modern Art, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, the Hirshhorn Museum, and the Institute of Contemporary Art in receiving AICA–USA's award. We share this honor with Antony Gormley, an artist of such extraordinary vision that he caused everyday New Yorkers to stop, look around them and experience New York and its architectural treasures and skyline in a totally new way.'

Tania Bruguera, whose exhibition at Neuberger Museum of Art won second place for Best Show in a University Gallery, commented on the award's significance for her ongoing work: 'Receiving the AICA Award encourages me to continue with great enthusiasm a new project, Immigrant Movement International, which will last a whole year.'
This year's awards will be presented by a distinguished group of current AICA members and former AICA honorees, including the artists Shirin Neshat, Christo, and Martin Puryear; the critic Peter Plagens; and the curators Connie Butler and Eugenie Tsai. Linda Nochlin, the Lila Acheson Wallace Professor of Modern Art at the Institute of Fine Arts/New York University, will present a lifetime achievement award for Distinguished Contribution to the Field of Criticism to Elizabeth C. Baker. There will also be a live artistic component to the evening: a video by William Kentridge and a light-and-sound piece by Kimsooja. Eleanor Heartney and Marek Bartelik will serve as emcees.

This year's Nominating Committee included: Eleanor Heartney (Chair), Marek Bartelik (AICA-USA President), Rachel Wolff (AICA-USA Vice-President), Barbara MacAdam (AICA-USA Board), Debra B. Balken, Michael Duncan, and Jeanne Claire van Ryzin.


The 2010 AICA Awards winners are:

1/ BEST PROJECT IN A PUBLIC SPACE

First Place:
'Cai Guo-Qiang: Fallen Blossoms'
Organized by the Fabric Workshop and Museum and Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, PA
Curated by Marion Boulton Stroud, Carlos Basualdo, and Adelina Vlas

Second Places:
'Duke Riley: Those About to Die Salute You'
Organized by the Queens Museum of Art, Queens, NY
Curated by Hitomi Iwasaki

'Antony Gormley: Event Horizon'
Organized by Madison Square Park Conservancy, New York, NY
Curated by Deborah Landau

2/ BEST SHOW IN A NON-PROFIT GALLERY OR SPACE

First Place:
'Leon Golub: Live & Die like a Lion?'
Organized by The Drawing Center, New York, NY
Curated by Brett Littman

Second Place:
'Ree Morton: At the Still Point of the Turning World'
Organized by The Drawing Center, New York, NY
Curated by João Ribas

3/ BEST SHOW IN A UNIVERSITY GALLERY

First Place:
'Heat Waves in a Swamp: The Paintings of Charles Burchfield'
Organized by the Hammer Museum of Art, UCLA, Los Angeles, CA
Curated by Robert Gober

Second Place:
'Tania Bruguera: On the Political Imaginary'
Organized by Neuberger Museum of Art, Purchase College, State University of New York, Purchase, NY
Curated by Helaine Posner

4/ BEST ARCHITECTURE OR DESIGN SHOW

First Place:
'Bauhaus 1919–1933: Workshops for Modernity'
Organized by the Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY in cooperation with the Bauhaus-Archiv Berlin, the Stiftung Bauhaus Dessau, and the Klassik Stiftung Weimar
Curated by Barry Bergdoll and Leah Dickerman

Second Places:
'Dead or Alive: Nature Becomes Art'
Organized by The Museum of Arts and Design, New York, NY
Curated by David Revere McFadden and Lowery Stokes Sims

' ...OUT OF HERE: The Veterans Project (by Krzysztof Wodiczko)'
Organized by The Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, MA
Curated by Randi Hopkins

5/ BEST SHOW INVOLVING DIGITAL MEDIA, VIDEO, FILM OR PERFORMANCE

First Place:
'Tino Sehgal'
Organized by the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY
Curated by Nancy Spector

Second Place:
'William Kentridge, I Am Not Me, the Horse is Not Mine'
Organized by Performa, as part of Performa 09, Cedar Lake, NY
Curated by RoseLee Goldberg

6/ BEST SHOW IN A COMMERCIAL GALLERY IN NEW YORK

First Place:
'Claude Monet'
Organized by Gagosian Gallery
Curated by Paul Hayes Tucker

Second Place:
'Primary Atmospheres: Works for California 1960-1970'
Organized by David Zwirner
Curated by Tim Nye and Kristine Bell

7/ BEST SHOW IN A COMMERCIAL GALLERY NATIONALLY

First Place:
'Lines, Shapes and Shadows: Robert Ryman, Fred Sandback, Richard Tuttle and Sol LeWitt'
Organized by Barbara Krakow Gallery, Boston, MA
Curated by Barbara Krakow and Andrew Witkin

Second Place:
'Noriko Ambe: ã‚­ã?« - Artist Books, Linear-Actions Cutting Project'
Organized by Lora Reynolds Gallery, Austin, TX

Curated by Glenn Fuhrman

8/ BEST MONOGRAPHIC MUSEUM SHOW IN NEW YORK

First Place:
'Marina Abramović: The Artist Is Present'
Organized by the Museum of Modern Art
Curated by Klaus Biesenbach

Second Place:
'Alias Man Ray: The Art of Reinvention'
Organized by The Jewish Museum
Curated by Mason Klein


9/ BEST MONOGRAPHIC MUSEUM SHOW NATIONALLY

First Place:
'Matisse: Radical Invention, 1913-1917'
Organized by the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL and the Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY
Curated by Stephanie D'Alessandro and John Elderfield

Second Place:
'Arshile Gorky: A Retrospective'
Organized by the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, PA in association with Tate Modern, London and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA
Curated by Michael Taylor

10/ BEST THEMATIC MUSEUM SHOW IN NEW YORK

First Place:
'In & Out of Amsterdam: Travels in Conceptual Art, 1960–1976'
Organized by the Museum of Modern Art
Curated by Christophe Cherix

Second Place:
'100 Years (version #2, ps1, nov 2009)'
Organized by MoMA PS1, Long Island City, NY and Performa
Curated by Klaus Biesenbach and RoseLee Goldberg with additional curatorial advice from Jenny Schlenzka

11/ BEST THEMATIC MUSEUM SHOW NATIONALLY

First Place:
'Seductive Subversion: Women Pop Artists, 1958-1968'
Organized by Rosenwald-Wolf, Hamilton Hall & Borowsky Galleries, University of the Arts, Philadelphia, PA
Curated by Sid Sachs 


Second Place:
'Constructive Spirit: Abstract Art in South and North America, 1920s-1950s'
Organized by Newark Museum, Newark, NJ
Curated by Mary Kate O'Hare

12/ BEST HISTORICAL MUSEUM SHOW NATIONALLY

First Place:
'Yves Klein: With the Void, Full Powers'
Organized by the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington D.C. and the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN
Curated by Kerry Brougher and Philippe Vergne

Second Place:
'Otto Dix'
Organized by Neue Galerie, New York, NY
Curated by Olaf Peters

ABOUT AICA-USA
AICA-USA is the United States section of the International Association of Art Critics (AICA), founded in June 1949 in Paris and originally affiliated with UNESCO as an NGO (non-governmental organization). Currently there are 63 member nations representing more than 4,500 art critics worldwide. AICA-USA, headquartered in New York, is the largest national section, with a membership of over 400 distinguished critics and scholars nationwide.
AICA-USA promotes critical discourse and is dedicated to expanding awareness of the values of art criticism as a discipline and acting in defense of the physical and moral value of art. It is the only organization to award excellence in museum and gallery exhibitions and does so to indicate the standards by which its members judge what they see.
In addition to its annual awards, AICA-USA presents panels, symposia, and a series of lectures and programs each year. These include the AICA-USA Distinguished Critic Lecture at the New School University, the AICA Young Critics panel in Boston, MA, studio visits with artists, a mentoring program for emerging art writers in partnership with the CUE Art Foundation, and an art writers workshop in partnership with Creative Capital Warhol Foundation. AICA-USA provides online resources on art criticism and professional issues on its website www.aicausa.org.
Membership in AICA is a professional honor and open to critics who have been publishing in the fields of modern and contemporary art at a high level and on a continuous basis for at least three years. For more information, visit www.aicausa.org