SAR Prize for Excellent Exposition 2021
The Executive Board of SAR is delighted to announce the winner of the Annual Prize for Excellent Research Catalogue Exposition 2021. The prize aims to foster and encourage innovative, experimental new formats of publication and to give visibility to the qualities of artistic research artefacts. We received eleven innovative submissions for the prize. The jury consisted of Paulo Luis Almeida on behalf of the Portal Partners, Ernie Roby-Tomic as one of the prize winners 2020, and Gabriele Schmid on behalf of the Executive Board of SAR. We felt that the exposition “Minuting. Rethinking the Ordinary Through the Ritual of Transversal Listening” by Jacek Smolicki met these conditions to an exceptional high level. He is followed by Alexandra Crouwers with her exposition “Plot, the Compositor, Mourning/Mistakes” on the second place and Timo Menke with his exposition “DARK MATTER(S)” on the third place.
- Jacek Smolicki
The jury was impressed by the quality of the intimate and coherent dialogue between images, text, hypertext and sound in Jacek Smolicki’s exposition “Minuting. Rethinking the Ordinary Through the Ritual of Transversal Listening” https://www.researchcatalogue.net/view/883787/895793 . The togetherness of these elements makes the viewer feel like walking into a complex and well-structured landscape.
The layout is attractive also in means of the integration of the sound bars as graphical elements. The mouse-over elements produce an extra layer that is nevertheless integrated into the aesthetic appearance of the exposition.
Smolicki’s research is wide and deep with the collection of samples spanning years presenting a compelling premise in the research. The concepts and narrative threads are emergent through the design and activation of the exposition through the Research Catalogue platform.
- Alexandra Crouwers
The exposition “Plot, the Compositor, Mourning/Mistakes” https://www.researchcatalogue.net/view/1057314/1273089 by Alexandra Crowers represents a speculative and non-linear design approach to the concept of exhibition. It creates an intricate network between visual pieces of evidence of the ecological collapse of a forest and a reflexive review of the artist’s grief.
Crouwers’s work thesis immediately resonated with the pandemic times experiencing virtual dislocation and complex mimeticism of nature in response to lockdowns. The work presented is timely as virtual workers and artists experience the technological takeover as physical communal spaces become increasingly rare. Alexandra’s background in virtual and technical art vibrates on the Research Catalogue platform as items that function to deliver information on the topic often also serve an aesthetic purpose supporting their thesis.
- Timo Menke
Timo Menke’s exposition DARK MATTER(S) https://www.researchcatalogue.net/view/829675/1122602 combines different exhibitions on the same subject in an innovative way, offering the experience of different navigation modes as an analogue of thinking.
Menke’s thoughtful intertwining of their exposition concepts and the Research Catalogue allows readers to accumulate concepts leading up to a wonderful collaborative performance.