One of Australia’s longest running and most prestigious prizes, the $35,000 Blake Prize engages contemporary artists with ideas of religion and spirituality. The 2018 iteration received an epic 769 entries from across Australia and the globe, from which 80 finalists were selected and one overall winner announced.
Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre (CPAC) awarded Sydney artist Tina Havelock Stevens the ‘65th Blake Prize’ at the official exhibition launch on Saturday 18 May.
Stevens’ work, Giant Rock (2017), is a performance video piece in which the artist explores how certain life beliefs for some are the antithesis for others with the use of a rock and roll drum kit. Filmed in situ at Giant Rock in the Mojave Desert, a once spiritual place that now attracts dirt bikes and graffiti, Stevens inhabits the location visually and sonically, tuning into the frequencies of the site and history of the place.
‘GIANT ROCK is a site considered a spiritual vortex and has drawn many throughout history from Native American chiefs who considered it holy ground to German loner Frank Critzer who made a living space underneath it in the 1930s before being killed there by authorities. Local George Van Tassel took Critzer’s space over and declared the rock had piezoelectric powers. He ran a successful UFO convention there for 20 years into the mid ’70s. The subterranean space was eventually concreted up leaving a flat platform on which I play.’ – Tina Havelock Stevens
Two additional prizes were awarded on the evening:
Pamela Leung received the $6,000 Blake Emerging Artist Prize for her work SORRY I NO UNDERSTAND (2018), a reflection on the experience of dislocation, and the humanity within social justice; while Tracey Clement was awarded the Blake Established Artist Residency, a one-month residency and solo exhibition at CPAC, for her sculptural piece Metropolis Experiment (2017), which depicts a post-apocalyptic vision of a ruined city.
The ‘65th Blake Prize’ finalists’ exhibition is on show at CPAC until Sunday 1 July 2018.