We are reporting the achievements of many previous prize-winners. It is a tribute to our prize committees, past and present, that their careful choices have resulted in a stellar group of artists, including a new prize-winner, Ghazaleh Avarzamani. These artists’ work and accomplishments continue to soar!
Laurie Kang – Artist Prize Finalist 2015
Ghazaleh Avarzamani – Artist Prize Winner 2022
Laurie Kang and Ghazaleh Avarzamani have been long-listed for the prestigious 2022 Sobey Art Award for emerging Canadian artists.Ghazaleh is one of TFVA’s newest prizewinners.
Laurie was recently included in Art in America’s annual feature on new talent. She is recognized for her photography-as-installation work and has also recently completed a residency at Horizon Art Foundation—a new downtown L.A. nonprofit nurturing emerging and mid-career artists from around the globe.
Click here to view the Sobey Award information and click on ‘Artists’ to find biographies of these two nominees
Click here to view an article on Laurie in Art in America
Click here to view a story about Laurie in the Los Angeles Times
Esmaa Mohamoud – Artist Prize Winner 2019
Sandra Brewster – Artist Prize Winner 2018
Esamaa Mohamoud and Sandra Brewster are featured artists at the Scotiabank Contact Photography Festival.
Esmaa’s work, The Brotherhood FUBU (For Us, By Us), is on display at the Westin Harbour Castle Conference Centre until April 1, 2023.
Sandra’s outdoor photographic installation, Roots, will be on display at Evergreen Brick Works until October 31, 2022.
Click here for more information about Esmaa Mohamoud at the Scotiabank Contact Photography Festival
Click here for more information about Sandra Brewster at the Scotiabank Contact Photography Festival
Click here for more information about the Scotiabank Contact Photography Festival
Edward Burtynsky – Founders Achievement Award 2008
The world premiere of Edward Burtynsky’s film, In the Wake of Progress, is coming to Luminato 2022. This immersive experience includes a blend of photography, film, and music to tell the tale of humanity’s impact on the planet.
Click here for more information and dates for this event
Burtynsky’s Anthropocene Project opened in April at Museum Helmond in the Netherlands.
Click here for more information on the Museum Helmond and this exhibition
Jen Aitken – Artist Prize Finalist 2021
Jen Aitken’s recent solo exhibition, Actually, at the Nicholas Metivier Gallery, included three new concrete sculptures from her Tattic series, as well as two- and three-dimensional drawings.
Click here to watch an interesting short film about her work and her thought process
Vanessa Dion Fletcher – Artist Prize Finalist 2020
Vanessa Dion Fletcher is part of the group exhibit, In My Skin, currently at the Dunlop Art Gallery in Regina. In the exhibition, the artists consider the dominant definitions of how one’s body should be and embrace the possibilities of what bodies can be.
Click here to see this exhibition
Click here to see Vanessa’s biography
Camille Turner – Artist Prize Finalist 2018
Camille Turner has won the Toronto Biennial, 2022 Artist Prize, awarded to recognize an artist’s outstanding contribution to the Biennial. Her multimedia installation, Nave (2022) is at the Small Arms Inspection Building until June. The work explores the entanglement of colonial Canada with the trade of enslaved Africans. This work was commissioned by the Toronto Biennial of Art and supported by ArtworxTO, the City of Toronto, the Toronto Arts Council and the Women Leading Initiative.
Click here to learn more about Camille Turner and Nave
Erika Defreitas – Artist Prize Finalist 2016
At the Toronto Biennial of Art, Erica Defreitas offered There are Fragments, a workshop where she shared her process for uncovering the narratives of collected, found images. This workshop was co-sponsored by C Magazine.
Click here to read about her workshop
On May 5, Erika Defreitas and Tim Whiten met at Whiten’s Toronto studio to discuss their creative processes, and to reflect on influences in their recent work.
Click here to listen to the interview
Nep Sidhu – Artist Prize Winner 2017
Nep Sidhu’s Paradox of Harmonics, his first U.S. museum solo exhibition, is currently on view at The Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit (MOCAD). In Paradox of Harmonics, the artist works with both sight and sound to consider individual responses to communal and individual remembrance.
Click here for more information on this exhibition
Shary Boyle – Artist Prize Finalist 2006
Shary Boyle’s remarkable exhibition, Outside the Palace of Me, closed at the Gardiner Museum on May 15. This multi-sensory installation re-imagined the museum as a collective performance space housing everything from drawings to ceramic sculptures to life-sized automatons.
Click here to read more about Outside the Palace
