Artadia is pleased to announce the 2021 Prospect Artadia Awardees:
Chandra McCormick and Monique Verdin will each receive $10,000 in unrestricted funds, as well as access to the ongoing benefits of the Artadia Award program. The decision followed an extensive jury process, culminating in a virtual studio visit with jurors Thomas Lax, Curator of Media and Performance at the Museum of Modern Art in New York; and Toccarra Thomas, Director of the Joan Mitchell Center in New Orleans. Both McCormick and Verdin participated in previous Prospect exhibitions, with McCormick showing in 2014 in Prospect.3: Notes for Now and Verdin in 2017 in Prospect.4: The Lotus in Spite of the Swamp.
Prospect.5: Yesterday we said tomorrow is the fifth edition of Prospect New Orleans, a citywide art exhibition. Participating artists have created projects that emerge from research into place, express connections to the past and to land, and seek to form and reflect community. They have considered the ways in which history continues to shape the present, and their artworks are testaments to acts of ritual, selfhood, and modes of resistance that define daily life in New Orleans and beyond. Their projects offer spaces of memorialization and mourning, and of imagination and togetherness. The 2021 Prospect Artadia Award application was open to visual artists working in any visual media, at any stage in their career, who had been living and working for a minimum of two years in New Orleans and who exhibited work in any iteration of Prospect, including Prospect.5.
On McCormick receiving the award, Lax notes, “Chandra McCormick’s documentary photographic practice provides a visual chronicle to the lived experiences of African-American life and inspiration to generations of New Orleanians cultural practitioners.”
Liberty Specialty Markets has selected Monique Verdin as the recipient of the Liberty Specialty Markets Artadia Award; of the Awardee, Senior Vice President Robert Pittinger notes, “We are delighted that Monique Verdin is the recipient of Liberty Specialty Markets Artadia Award. We hope the award will help this internationally recognized artist flourish, grow and build greater awareness of her inspiring works exploring the natural tensions between sea and land in coastal Louisiana. As a leading fine art insurer, we’re dedicated to protecting single works of art and collections, but it’s also important to us that we support the art community. The Artadia program, which helps artists to flourish in their local communities and beyond, fits with our philanthropic culture and our commitment to supporting the arts in our communities around the world.”
Of the Prospect Artadia Awards, Executive Director of Prospect New Orleans Nick Stillman comments, “This is a wonderful way to honor New Orleans’ rich community of contemporary artists. I couldn’t be happier for Chandra and Monique, two artists from the Prospect family who are each so deserving of this award.”
The 2021 Prospect Artadia Award application was open to visual artists working in any visual media, at any stage in their career, who had been living and working for a minimum of two years in New Orleans and who exhibited work in any iteration of Prospect, including Prospect.5.
The 2021 Prospect Artadia Awards are generously supported by Prospect.5 New Orleans, Liberty Specialty Markets, as well as the Artadia Board of Directors, Artadia Council Members, and individual donors across the country.