Tentative calendar:
February 1, 2016:Competition opens, submissions accepted via CaFE
May 15, 2016: Deadline for submissions. Submissions will be accepted via CaFE until 11:59 PM (Mountain Time), according to the CaFE clock.
May 16-June 4, 2016: First round of jury - Review of all submissions via CaFE
June 5, 2016: The finalists will be notified by email, on or before June 5, 2016. Within a few days after the finalists are notified, an announcement of the finalists and digital images of their drawings will be posted on The Artist for Artists Project website.
June 24-25, 2016: Finalist's submission deadline. Shipped artwork form finalist must arrive at The Artist for Artists Project for the Juror's Second Review and the Williams Prize in Drawing Exhibition. Hand-delivered work must arrive at the exhibition venue during the specified drop-off times. Drop-off times will be sent to all artists selected by the juror.
June 28-July 24, 2016:The Williams Prize in Drawing Exhibition on view at the Silpe Gallery at the Hartford Art School
July 24, 2016: Award winners will be announced at the FLASH EKPHRASTIC event on July 9, 2016. All award winners will be notified by email, and after notification, the prize winners will be announced on The Artist for Artists Project website. Award checks will be mailed within two weeks after the prize winners are announced and should be received by the prize-winning artists by August 7, 2016.
July 25-28, 2016: All drawings will be returned to artists. Shipped drawings will be shipped back. Hand-delivered drawings will be available for pick up during designated times. Designated pick-up times will be arranged and announced to the artists participating in the Williams Prize in Drawing Exhibition.
What we are looking for:
The Williams Prize in Drawing for Emerging Artists is designed for applicants who are creating 2D drawings with either traditional methods, or more experimental contemporary approaches and materials, excepting digitally created or enhanced art. Drawing media that are encourage include, but are not limited to, chalk, charcoal, color pencil, Conte,, graphite, marker, metal-point, pastel, and pen & ink. There is no theme that must be suggested by the artist, but all art must be original and completed independently within the past 5 years. (i.e. 2011-present).
"Emerging artists" are those artists who self-identify as "emerging" rather than "mid-career" or "established" artists. Applicants may be recent graduates or currently enrolled in any BFA or MFA degree-granting art school in the United States, working in an "atelier" school, working independently on their art without any institutional affiliation, or even working in some teaching capacity. There are no upper age limits for artists.
Entry Fee:
$35 for 2 drawings, including detail images. Entrants may submit additional drawings, up to 10, including detail images, for an additional $5.00 per drawing/detail. The entry fee must accompany the submission through CaFE and can be paid only by credit card, or pre-paid credit card. All entry fees are non-refundable.*
*The Artist for Artists Project supports all aspects of the Williams Prize in Drawing for Emerging Artists competition with the nominal entry fees charged. From each artist who enters comes a fee that helps to provide for the prizes, the juror, and all activities and additional costs associated with promoting the work of the artists selected by the juror. It is for this reason that all entry fees are non-refundable. Please know that your entry fee is helping to encourage and further the work of fellow emerging artists.
Poets were invited to participate in our FLASH EKPHRASTIC! opening event on July 9, 2016 from 1-3pm in the gallery. The 2016 Williams Prize finalists and winners are posted on our homepage. (The winners of the 11 monetary awards were announced at the FLASH EKPHRASTIC! event.) The drawings that were selected by the poets as their inspiration are listed, with the poems selected by our poetry juror, on our FLASH EKPHRASTIC! page. Read more...
The Williams Prize in Drawing for Emerging Artists is a celebration of drawing as a critical element in contemporary art making and as an art form with powerful expressive possibilities. The prize was designed to provide a venue through which emerging artists can share, on a national stage, both their unique visions and their drawing skills. This year, artists competed for one of the eleven monetary awards and selection by our 2016 juror, Douglas Martenson, for a spot in the Williams Prize in Drawing Exhibition at the Silpe Gallery.
The Awards:
First Prize: $1000
Juror's Choice Awards: 10 awards, $200 each
Submission deadline: May 15, 2016
Submission process:
All submissions for The Williams Prize in Drawing Exhibition will be handled through CaFE. CaFE is an online application system for call for entry. Artists may use the CaFE system for free. Submitting artists should create an artists' profile on CaFE, upload their images and then apply to the Williams Prize in Drawing Exhibition. Please visit the CaFE website (www.callforentry.org) to learn how to submit with the simple 3-part process.
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Our 2016 Juror: Douglas Martenson (www.douglasmartenson.com)
Since 2010 Douglas Martenson has served as Chair of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (PAFA) Faculty Committee. He is also a Lecturer in Figure Drawing at the University of Pennsylvania. In 2013 Martenson curated The Artist’s Response to Nature: Tonalism, Historical and Contemporary at the PAFA museum.Martenson teaches Figure Composition, Landscape, Figure Painting and Figure Drawing in the Certificate/BFA program. He also teaches in the Continuing Education program.
Martenson is the recipient of several grants and awards, including a Pennsylvania Council on the Arts Fellowship (1996), Individual Creative Opportunity stipends from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts (2000, 2002), a Pew Fellowship in the Arts grant for study at the Vermont Studio Center (1993), a Cresson European Traveling Scholarship and the Philadelphia Mayor's Award from PAFA (1981, 1982).
Martenson is a graduate of PAFA and studied at the Vermont Studio Center. He has lived in the Philadelphia area since 1978. Martenson exhibits regularly, having shown work in galleries in New York as well as the Sherry French Gallery and the Gross McCleaf Gallery, Philadelphia; the Vose Galleries, Boston; and the Courthouse Gallery in Ellsworth, Maine.
(Drawings pictured above are the work of our 2016 juror, Douglas Martenson)
About the 2016 Williams Prize in Drawing:
The 2016 Winners and Finalists are posted on our home page. The 2016 Williams Prize in Drawing Exhibition ran from June 28 through July 24, 2016 at the Silpe Gallery at the Hartford Art School on the campus of the University of Hartford in West Hartford, Connecticut.
View photos from the show below, both the empty gallery, and the gallery as people were arriving for the FLASH EKPHRASTIC event on July 9, 2016.