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The "Purvītis" Prize 2017

In association with the Arterritory.com art and culture portal and 2017 Purvītis Prize, Gallery Park Hotel Riga will become the first venue in Riga to launch the 10th anniversary celebrations of the prize, an extremely significant phenomenon on the Latvian art scene, on 9 February 2017 with the opening of a small-scale exhibition Where Did You Get It? by sculptor Gļebs Panteļejevs, a 2013 Purvītis Prize candidate.

One of the eight shortlisted candidates in 2013, Gļebs Panteļejevs is a prominent figure of Latvian contemporary sculpture and, at the same time, a typical representative of the 21st-century intellectual post-modernism. His art is defined by an admirable feel for the material and a sculptural virtuosity, employed to prompt the viewer to reflect, and to challenge stereotyped notions. 

Since its launch in 2007, the Purvītis Prize, named after Latvia’s most famous landscape painters and founder of the Latvian Academy of Art, has earned the status of the most prestigious contemporary art award in Latvia and the whole Baltic region. It is awarded biennially to an artist or group of artists for a work that is emblematic of the contemporary art scene and, simultaneously, of the contemporary life, spiritual and intellectual ideals and processes. The first Purvītis Prize was awarded in 2009. To date, the prize has been won by artists Katrīna Neiburga, Kristaps Ģelzis, Andris Eglītis and Miķelis Fišers.

The winner of the 2017 Purvītis Prize will be named on 17 February 2017 during a special ceremony. The recipient of the prize is chosen by an international panel of experts comprising Māra Lāce (Director of the Latvian National Museum of Art), Jānis Zuzāns (Chair of the Board of SIA Alfor company, the principal supporter of LNMA), Thaddaeus Ropac (art gallerist, Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac Paris/Salzburg/London, Austria), Juliet Bingham (curator at Tate Modern, UK), Hedwig Fijen (Founding Director of the Manifesta International Foundation, the Netherlands), Rebecca Russo (art collector, Italy), Mark Allen Svede (art historian, lecturer at the Ohio State University, USA).

17 February will also see the opening of the exhibition by eight shortlisted 2017 Purvītis Prize candidates (Arturs Bērziņš, Ivars Drulle, Kristaps Epners, Atis Jākobsons,  Voldemārs Johansons,  Maija Kurševa, Anda Lāce and group of artists: Krišs Salmanis, Anna Salmane, Kristaps Pētersons), which will be on view through 9 April 2017 at the Great Exhibition Hall of the newly-built extension of the Latvian National Museum of Art building. 
/ 19.01.2017 /
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