Congratulations to Ida Sophia, winner of the Art Gallery of South Australia’s (AGSA) $100,000 Ramsay Art Prize, a biennial acquisitive art prize for contemporary Australian artists under forty working in any medium, including sculpture, painting, drawing, photography, installation and the moving image. This year’s winning performance-based video work, Witness, 2022, will premiere in the Ramsay Art Prize 2023 exhibition on view at AGSA from 27 May to 27 August.
AGSA Director Rhana Devenport ONZM said, “The Ramsay Art Prize sets out to elevate and accelerate careers for contemporary Australian artists. Ida Sophia is clearly at a pivotal point in her career – her winning work Witness is technically and conceptually resolved, capturing the breadth of her practice to this point.”
Ida Sophia with Witness in Ramsay Art Prize 2023, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide. Photograph: Saul Steed
Informed by the South Australian artist’s early childhood experience of observing her father’s baptism, Witness was shot in a single take at The Pool of Siloam in Wirmalngrang/Beachport in regional South Australia. The single-channel video work depicts the artist in performance, undergoing a repetitive and intense series of submergences that take a single baptism to the level of relentless obsession.
Sophia is a performance artist with a hybrid media, sculpture and installation practice that draws on the body to render performative works. Beginning with personal narratives, Sophia’s work is characterised by conceptual examinations of universal, uncomfortable human experiences such as hope, regret, familial tension and grief.
The 2023 judging panel comprised Aaron Seeto, Director of the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Nusantara, Jakarta; Perth-based visual artist and creative producer Erin Coates; and Nici Cumpston OAM, AGSA’s Artistic Director of Tarnanthi and Curator of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art.
Ida Sophia, Witness, 2022, Adelaide and Beachport, South Australia, single-channel HD 4k video. Photograph: Thomas McCammon. Courtesy the artist
The judges were unanimous in their decision, with the winning work impressing them “with its sophisticated concept, personal symbolism, and emotional connection to the site of performance. We were particularly struck by the integration of durational performance and its translation into video, which created a visceral experience for the viewer,” commented Aaron Seeto.
The Ramsay Art Prize is held every two years, with the winning work being acquired into AGSA’s collection.
The Ramsay Art Prize 2023 also includes a People’s Choice Prize, a non-acquisitive cash prize of $15,000 chosen by public vote and announced on Friday 11 August.
