The states of painting prizes
Maybe itʼs hard to believe that an exchange between China and the UK in this tiny prize, compared to say, the rest of the Liverpool Biennial 2012 Hospitality, and in particular the Hong Kong: All Are Guests, Chow Chun-fai, LEUNG Mee-ping, CoLAB × SLOW at City States in the Copperas Hill Building (a huge disused sorting office for Royal Mail), would reflect a whole contraband of political and social issues in the way specifically painting, or now a generation of artists are using painting, to deal with sociality, city, politics, participation, interventions, occupation, in a museum with dedicated gallery space for them. Wait, are they? There are plenty of painting prizes all around the world. A few examples from the UK are the Marmite Prize, The Door Prize and Turner Prize. So how is the John Moores Painting Prize any different to these? Well, there isnʼt a painting movement in Liverpool, say to London but nearly all selected for the John Moores Painting Prize studied and or are based in London to exhibit in the Walker Gallery. However this is critical to understanding why it adds something unique to a space in the Walker. In 1957, Sir John Moores a philanthropist and entrepreneur wrote a letter to the editor of the Sunday Times explaining the purpose for opening the prize at the Walker Gallery to ʻ…give Merseyside a chance to see an exhibition of painting and sculpture embracing the most best and vital work being produced today and throughout the country… and furthermore to encourage contemporary artists, particularly the young and progressive.ʼ The John Moores Prize China formed in 2010 counter attacks a long legacy of painters in the UK and makes it more interesting in these two rooms full of sixty-two exhibiting artists. Chinese artists have used space to exhibit in western culture, and more relevantly in western painting since the 1980ʼs. So what makes the John Moores Prize China different from Hong Kong: All Are Guests? Perhaps this will eventually root back to the idea of not just intervention in spaces but a fiddly idea of occupation. This makes City States Hong Kong: All Are Guests interesting in the Liverpool Biennial and the John Moores China interesting in a museum. The John Moores Painting Prize UK always loads the space with paintings but what if they were too able to re-think this space and relationships between these two rooms in the Walker Gallery to then re-think the distribution of painting? This could happen by re-thinking paintings energy back into its catalogue with writing and introduction to a new type of catalogue. The John Moores Painting Prize catalogues since 1957 have produced the same design: photograph and text. No critical, exciting texts to paintings wider evolution in the art world, and therein its influence on these shifts happening today, no links to websites, publications, or further research for anyone to use. Paintings energy influenced European zines, newspapers and publications which therein led to a part of the design and writing in breaking manifestos as early as the 20th century- the Futurists, Dadaists and De Stijl. For example the Cullinan Richards Collapse publications available online as PDF directed through the John Moores Painting Prize website includes Collapse 08-11, Collapse Texts, and Collapse Savage Schools. They are exhibiting Collapse into Abstract (black) at the John Moores Prize 2012, which was used as photographs and writings for the publications on separate exhibitions.
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In September I worked collaboratively on a five-day project at DBH offices located in the Liverpool film studios, a regeneration business centre renting out office spaces and units after the capital of culture in 2008. We were thinking about how useful painting is and our interest in our subject matter: landscape in painting, as it has been the backdrop for painting over the last millennium. This lead to discussing how there are major anxieties about architectural space artists are using, exchanging and producing work in. This seems more so in the arts by commodification of studio, art school, and museum and now the evolution of gallery, artist-run spaces (in Liverpool, growing spaces such as The Royal Standard.) This also has lead me to think how painting is used in office spaces, what is its social function today in spaces where any big institution can put on a big painting show and call it any kind of prize. At City States between 13th-14th October, The Mobile Art School: Use Value and Future of the Art School brought together leading thinkers, myself as a ex student and three other recent graduates from John Moores Art and Design Academy, BA students from Hildesheim in Germany and MA students from the Dutch Institute of arts and asked ʻCan art schools help to train artists to become useful members of their society?ʼ I guess my question is, can museums and galleries also do the same? Perhaps the exchange through Shanghai University, John Moores China and Liverpool John Moores Art and Design Academy will do that for this particular prize. References: Walker Art Gallery [online] John Moores Prize Available at: http://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/walker/johnmoores/ Eastside Projects [online] Birmingham and The Magic City Available at: http://www.eastsideprojects.org/elsewhere/birmingham-the-magic-city/ Liverpool Biennial [online] The Mobile Art School: Use Value and Future of the Art School Available at: http://liverpoolbiennial.co.uk/programmes/festivals/whatson/0/4/2012/452/themobile-art-school-use-value-and-future-of-the-art-school/ Liverpool Biennial [online] City States Available at: http://liverpoolbiennial.co.uk/news/37/city-states-2012-artist-list/ Cullinan Richard –[online] Collapse PDFʼs, Available at: http://www.cullinanrichardscollapse.com/