NAM JUNE PAIK AWARD 2008
International Media Art Award of the
Arts Foundation North-Rhine Westphalia
Prizewinner Attila Csörgő, Hungary
Presentation of the 4th Nam June Paik Award 2008 of the Kunststiftung NRW to the Hungarian artist Attila Csörgő
The winner will receive 25,000 EUR. Newcomer prizes of 7,500 EUR go to Thorsten Hallscheidt and Adriane Wachholz.
The announcement of the prizewinners and the official presentation of the 4th Nam June Paik Award 2008 and newcomer prizes for young artists from North Rhine-Westphalia by the president of the Kunststiftung, Dr. Fritz Schaumann, took place on October 16, 2008 at 6 pm, in the presence of the three artists, at the Wallraf-Richartz Museum & Fondation Corboud in Cologne. The exhibition by the five nominated artists and artist groups can be seen until November 16, 2008.
The jury for the 4th Nam June Paik award and NRW Newcomer Prize 2008 consists of Prof. Mischa Kuball, Academy of Media Arts, Cologne, Prof. Katharina Sieverding, University of the Arts, Berlin, and Dr. Barbara Honrath, head of the visual arts department of the Munich Goethe Institute. The jury explained its decision for the artist Attila Csörgő from Budapest, Hungary as follows:
“The prizewinner Attila Csörgő invents visual machines that extent the spectrum of human vision. Constructed by simple means, Csörgő’s apparatus record traces of light that in the form of a Möbius strip or an orange peel create entirely new visual experiences which escape the biological determinacy of human perception. Csörgő’s unpretentious photography (in its literal sense of drawing with light) leads back down the artistic road to the quiet calm of timeless photography. The experimental nature of Attila Csörgő’s artistic approach shows much closeness to the work and thought of Nam June Paik, both in its playful curiosity and its intellectual mastery of cognitive inquiry.”
In 2008 the NRW Newcomer Prize will be shared by two artists. With this prize the Kunststiftung NRW pursues the aim of supporting young artists in NRW on the threshold between artistic training and career. Apart from the financial support they also gain the possibility of taking part in the exhibition by nominees for the 5th Nam June Paik Award in 2010. This year the jury, chaired by Prof. Mischa Kuball, Academy of Media Arts, Cologne, selected Adriane Wachholz, Academy of Fine Arts Münster, and Thorsten Hallscheidt, Academy of Media Arts, Cologne. The jury explained its decision with the following statement:
“In her installations Adriane Wachholz convincingly refers digital media back to analogue drawing. Magical spaces emerge, as in the Wewerka Pavilion in Münster, which display a sensitive transition from the private to the public realm. The jury was convinced by the poetic power of this artist’s work, which is not afraid to confront the viewer with fragile elements or to demand exact observation. An artistic position that lays claim to a very distinct approach.”
“The installations of Thorsten Hallscheidt are concerned with universal themes, but operate conceptually through his own person and biography. Systems like those of the mathematician David Hilbert and other configurative models are the basis of his artistic ideas and form the starting points for his complex spaces. The image is often governed by sound, and the viewer is required to find his/her own system of navigation. With this prize the jury honors an artist of great originality and maturity.”
The Kunststiftung NRW established these awards in 2002 with the aim of supporting both regional and international artists. The award is intended to keep alive the still powerful creative energy of the work of Nam June Paik both in Germany and overseas, and to encourage younger generations of artists to follow his innovative example.
The nominees of the 4th Nam June Paik Award, the so-called shortlist, were chosen by a group of experts chaired by Udo Kittelmann, Museum of Modern Art, Frankfurt am Main. Nominated were Julia Meltzer and David Thorne (Damascus/Los Angeles), BCL/ Shiho Fukuhara & Georg Tremmel (Tokyo/London), Attila Csörgő (Budapest), Tatiana Blass (São Paulo) and the GIA Grupo de Interferência Ambiental (Salvador de Bahía). The newcomer prizewinner of 2006, Johanna Reich (Cologne) took part in this year’s nominee exhibition.
The distinctive feature of the 4th Nam June Paik Award lies in the contrast between digital and analogue, contemporary and historical works of art in the Wallraf in Cologne. This dialogue between the nominated works and those from the medieval and baroque periods to impressionism reveals, despite their differences, many surprising cross-connections in terms of both form and content. The Wallraf-Richartz Museum & Fondation Corboaud is delighted by this new impetus amid its historical collection and will continue to present the dialogue until November 16, 2008.
For more information please contact:
Kunststiftung NRW
Roßstraße 133
40476 Düsseldorf
Germany
phone 0049-211-650 40 70
info@kunststiftungNRW.de
WALLRAF-RICHARTZ MUSEUM & FONDATION CORBOUD
Obenmarspforten (by Cologne City Hall)
50667 Köln
Germany
Tel.: 0049-221 / 2 21 2 11 19
Fax: 0049-221 / 2 21 2 26 29
wallraf@museenkoeln.de
Opening hours
Tue./Wed./Fri. 10 am – 6 pm
Sat./Son./holidays 11 am – 6 pm
Thur. 10 am – 10 pm
Mon. closed