I was surprised to hear from Professor Anita Taylor, Director of the Jerwood Drawing Prize, how the three strong panel of judges* chose the 61 drawings included in the 22nd prize exhibition (Jerwood Space London to 23 Oct**, then touring to Bath, Leigh and Poole). All 2,537 entries were gathered for physical inspection of the original in a two day binge, no pre-sifting, no jpegs. Then, not only were the judges not told the names of the artists, they weren’t given titles, nor any statements about the work – so the focus was very purely on the drawing. They did well, then, to light on quite a few interesting processes and subjects which I’m not sure I’d have worked out without the helpful summaries written subsequently for the catalogue. Would I have deduced that my favourite work here – Nathan Antony’s video ‘Black Friday’ – was made by applying a hair dryer to the thermally sensitive surface of a till receipt, then letting it unroll naturally? That Julia Hutton’s subtle lines were made by burning as the sun streamed through her studio window? Would I have guessed that the figures-come totems in Michael Hancock’s ‘Allotment 3’ are decayed Brussels sprout roots? The £8,000 first prize was awarded to another filmed process, Solveig Settemsdal’s ‘Singularity’, nine minutes following white ink suspended in cubes of gelatine.
* Artist Glenn Brown and museum directors Paul Hobson and Stephanie Buck
** The London venue has the bonus of Jasmine Johnson’s installation bringing African wildlife into the café courtesy of the world’s largest collection of game shot by one man, which turns out to be at the Powell-Cotton Museum in Kent.
Most days art Critic Paul Carey-Kent spends hours on the train, traveling between his home in Southampton and his day job in London. Could he, we asked, jot down whatever came into his head?
