The 2023 Geelong Acquisitive Print and Ursula Hoff Institute Awards recipients have been announced, with Marian Crawford and Christopher Orr taking out the top spots.
The Melbourne-based artists were among many established and emerging print-makers from around Australia battling it out for the national award, with their pieces featured at the Geelong Gallery.
Ms Crawford received the $10,000 Geelong Acquisitive Print Award for her piece, A Blizzard, which uses two key literacy sources to challenge the role of media and its presence in everyone’s lives.
“I am really thrilled and overwhelmed to have received this prestigious Award,” she said.
“To have had my artwork, A Blizzard, so carefully considered by the three well-respected judges and to know my work will now be included in the Geelong Gallery Collection is a great feeling.
“It provides an enormous professional as well as financial support for my work as an artist into the future.”
Mr Orr said that winning the $5,000 Ursula Hoff Institute Award was beyond his “wildest expectations” for Served Bold, a piece that speaks to the power of technology in the 21st century.
“I created this piece specifically for the 2023 Geelong Acquisitive Print Awards,” he said.
“I was thrilled to see my work in such a beautiful gallery amongst such prolific artists.
“It took several months of reworking, and I was still finessing it within an hour of the submission deadline.
“It is a tough graft surviving as an artist, and this prize has been a great impetus for me to progress my art.
“I’d like to thank the judges, all the amazing staff at Geelong Gallery, and all the other artists for their incredible work.”
This year’s winners were selected by panel judges; independent curator and writer Kirsty Grant, Geelong Gallery director and chief executive Jason Smith and gallery senior curator Lisa Sullivan.
