Awards
HM Queen Sonja Art Foundation was established in 2011 to generate interest in and promote the development of graphic art. The Foundation presents three awards every other year.
With its focus on international graphic art in all its expressions and techniques, the Queen Sonja Print Awards are set to become the most prestigious prizes within this field of contemporary art.
Queen Sonja Print Award
The Queen Sonja Print Award has become the world’s leading award for graphic art and is presented every other year to an ambitious and promising artist who has excelled in the field of printmaking. A wide range of international professionals, curators, artists and art institutions nominate talented artists from all over the world for this prestigious prize.
The nominees reflect the breadth of contemporary printmaking around the world, ranging from traditional forms to new approaches involving installation, collage and performance. No printing technique or way of expression is to be excluded as long as the printing element is apparent. There is no age limit, but older and clearly long-established artists will not be considered for this award.
The prize is determined by the board, and taken from the yield on the Foundation’s capital, along with gifts and other contributions received by the Foundation.
Recipients of the Queen Sonja Print Award:
- 2024: Tomas Colbengtson
- 2022: Yto Barrada, France/Morocco
- 2020: Ciara Phillips, Canada/UK
- 2018: Emma Nishimura, Canada
- 2016: Tauba Auerbach, USA
- 2014: Svend-Allan Sørensen, Denmark
- 2012: Tiina Kivinen, Finland
Winners and Nominees
Award Winner 2024: Tomas Colbengtson
Statement from the jury:
"The jury expresses deep admiration for Tomas Colbengtson’s exploration of printmaking within a practice that transcends the boundaries of art to gain socio-political relevance. A Sámi artist, Colbengtson utilizes the printed medium to address societal issues faced by indigenous communities, promting reflections on history and questioning its truths. His distinctive approach to printmaking pushes boundaries by incorporating performative elements into his creations, which he often locates within Sámi landscapes. Through his work, he reclaims them as lived indigenous spaces for the present and future.
With a career spanning over three decades, Colbengtson has consistently and fearlessly explored new forms of printed media and materials. From overlay glass to metal printing, etching, and digital art forms, he experiments to construct a language that captures the partial loss and contemporary recovery of Sámi identity and ways of life. The jury emphasizes the significance of Colbengtson’s powerful and thought-provoking message, which extends beyond the local context and resonates with equivalent movements across the world."
Her Majesty Queen Sonja of Norway said: “I am delighted that this year the award has gone to a Sami artist. Tomas Colbengtson’s work is already represented in museum collections and I hope this prize will make his work known even more widely internationally.”
Nominees 2024
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Admir Ganić
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Andrea Buettner
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Ann Aspinwall
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Bella Logachova
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Cathrine Raben Davidsen
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Christiane Baumgartner
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Cristina Iglesias
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Dan Walsh
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Debra Welch
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Do Ho Suh
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Dobrinya Ivanov
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El Anatsui
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Emanuele Becheri
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Endi Poskovic
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Espen Dietrichson
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Frederic Coché
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Gianna Bentivenga
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Idun Baltzersen
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Inka Bell
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Jockum Nordström
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Johanna Love
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Katherine Jones
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Kristina Chan
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La Impresora
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Leonardo Frigo
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Lise Harlev
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Lucy Skaer
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Magda Stawarska
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Maja Maljevic
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Martin García-Rivera
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Matthew Brannon
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Mette Winckelmann
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Miina Aho
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Nastia Cistakova
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Nazar Yahya
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Nguyen Khac Han
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Patrik Berg
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Paul Croft
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Paulina Włostowska
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Praween Piangchoompu
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Päivikki Kallio
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Robin Clifford Ellis
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Santidio Pereira
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Seher Shah
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Shireen Taweel
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Soghra Khurasani
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Srabani Sarkar
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Tammy Nguyen
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Todd Anderson
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Tomas Colbengtson
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Toril Johannessen
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Tue Greenfort
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Tuukka Peltonen
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Volodymyr Andriiovych Moiseienko
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Wendimagegn Belete
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Yoonmi Nam
Award Winner 2022: Yto Barrada
Statement from the jury:
"The jury is deeply impressed by Yto Barrada’s multidisciplinary practice where printmaking, printed matter or methods of reproduction are used with effortless ease to serve conceptual purposes. Informed by postcolonial thought and socio-political concerns, the artist engages in topics of identity, urban development, nature or collective memory. Her eclectic use of traditional printmaking techniques such as woodblock, serigraphy or letterpress printing, as well as risograph prints and different photo printing techniques, allows her the flexibility to simultaneously work with text, image and more abstract motifs.
Barrada investigates archival practices, poster traditions, institutionalized narratives and propaganda production, to create real and imaginary stories. There is a poignant playfulness and curiosity in her multifaceted artistic production. The jury is fascinated by Barrada’s continuous search for new forms of expressions, pushing the boundaries of her own practice and our understanding of printmaking and graphic art."
Nominees 2022
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Abaño, Ma. Victoria
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Ablozhnyy, Bogdan
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Aninat, Francisca
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Aragón, Miguel A.
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Baldridge, Glen
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Baltzersen, Idun
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Bang, Emma
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Barrada, Yto
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Behn-Eschenburg, Andreas
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Beltre, Mildred
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Bentivenga, Maria Pina
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Boe, Signe
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Chen, Hammer
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Chua, Genevieve
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Cronk, Ryan
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Dietrichson, Espen
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Drewett, Holly
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Duncan, Sarah
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Emmons, Amze
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Fleckner, Ester
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Ford, Raque
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Fourie, Heidi
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Frorup, Kendra
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Garfield, Jake
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Grothe, Kristin
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Halder, Rajat Suvra
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Hallapuro, Mari Elina
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Hals, Ellisif
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Heck, Ellen
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Hobbs, LaToya
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Holzer, Lisa
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Ho-You, Jill
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Jano, Januario
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Johnson, Luke
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JULM studios
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Kononov-Gredin, Vasily
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Kopansky, Taras Y.
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Krasnik, Rebecca
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Ladha, Shivangi
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Liberg, Cathrine A.
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Lloyd, Elizabeth
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Lopez, Fabricio
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Lüscher, Marius
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Matokovic, Mario
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Money, Jazz Ash
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Mutiti, Nontsikelelo
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Mørkeberg, Mie
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Marcke, Sarah van
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Pereira, Santídio
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Pinto, Soledad
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Ploug, Anne Marie
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Powell, Freya
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Powell, Jaime E.
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Presanvorakitkool, Chisanuphool
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Ramírez, Daniel L.
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Rejs, Jolanta
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Ropeyarn, Teho
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Rutar, Kristina
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Shah, Seher
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Shirin, Salehi
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Stawarska-Beavan, Magda
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Stibbon, Emma
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Svätopluk, Mikyta
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Syrjämäki, Annika
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Sysi, Suvi
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Tuttle, Martha
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Vanni, Éugenia
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Vulpes, Sonja
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Walker, Kara
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Winckelmann, Mette
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Woo, Ian
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Yahya, Nazar
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Yamanoi, Risako
Award Winner 2020: Ciara Phillips
Statement from the jury:
"The jury is unanimously convinced by the fervor of Ciara Phillips’ commitment to the medium of printmaking, the boldness of her formal and social experiments within it, and the maturity and confidence of her artistic outlook and attainment in general. Her belief in collaborative practice, manifest in her ongoing Workshop project, grows from a set of political and aesthetic concerns that she elaborates and elevates through concerted making.
Beyond her graphic and compositional prowess, Phillips is also a keen spatial thinker, adept at expanding beyond the conventional wall and frame. Without sacrificing seriousness, her work is imbued with a sense of wonder and delight in the serendipity and collaborative nature of this creative process. The jury further believes that Phillips is at an ideal point in her career to both benefit from and bring credit to the prize, giving renewed prominence to the field of printmaking and the Foundation’s role within it."
Ciara Phillips, "Affinity", 2018
Woodcut, relief print and screenprint on paper
200 x 240 cm
Photo: Daniel Persson
Courtesy of the artist
Nominees 2020
![Vilela, Fernando, "Untitled [Säo Paulo City series]", 2012](https://qspa-web.imgix.net/artworks/QSPA-Award/Award-2020/QSPA-2020-Nominees/Vilela-Fernando.jpg?auto=compress%2Cformat&crop=focalpoint&fit=crop&fp-x=0.5&fp-y=0.5&h=532&q=90&w=760&s=eadcd94b511837ebd23af75cd3e8f6a8)
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Alsharif, Azar
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Andersen, Julie Riis
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Baltzersen, Idun
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Bang, Malou da Cunha
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Bariball, Anna
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Bell, Inka
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Benjelloun, Zineb
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Causic, Mario
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Chan, Kristina
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Dawood, Shezad
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Giri, Khokan
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Harris, Caroline Jane
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Herrera, Inma
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Homsombut, Pimpen
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Hultenberg, Kristofer
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Kazama, Sachiko
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Khumalo, Themba
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Kipruto, Abdul
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Kovach, Taras
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Layton, Sophie
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Mackay, Madeline
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Malling, Sverre
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Marin, Livia
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Mohorovic, Tina
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Nio-Juss, Noora
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Nirmal, Madhini
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Oliver, Marilène
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Phillips, Ciara
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Phu, Jason
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Pojar, Stefanie
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Provosty, Nathalie
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Quamina, Simonette
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Quang Pham Khac
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Sami, Awni
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Sass, Julie
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Sorel, Agathe
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Thongpayong, Amorn
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Umberto, Giovanni
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Vasiljeva, Ola
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Vilela, Fernando
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Welker, Joshua
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Zamojski, Honza
Award Winner 2018: Emma Nishimura
Statement from the jury:
"The jury has been deeply impressed by the consistent quality in Emma Nishimura’s body of work. The artist explores notions of memory and how history is interpreted and re-negotiated, through a varied use of traditional and contemporary printmaking techniques. From miniscule hand-etched texts used in the topographic contours on maps, to photogravure on paper successfully molded three-dimensionally, the artist incorporates traces of history and individual stories exploring spatial and temporal realities. Nishimura questions the parameters of history through collected stories, inherited narratives, geography and family photos. Her body of work is exquisite and consistent – an exceptional thoroughness is at the core of her art practice."
Recipient of the Queen Sonja Print Award 2018: Emma Nishimura
Nominees 2018
Roma Auskalnyte, (Lithuania), Christiane Baumgartner (Germany), Andrea Büttner (Germany), Phillip Chen (USA), Weixin Quek Chong (Singapore),Chad Cordeiro & Nathaniel Sheppard III (South Africa), Keith Coventry (Great Britain), Damien De Lepeleire (Belgium), Peter Drew (Australia), Christian Rodriguez Fuentes (Chile), Matjaž Geder (Slovenia), Versia Abeda Harris (Barbados), Mattias Härenstam(Sweden), Merja Isomaa-James (Finland), Hansina Iversen (Faroe Islands), Michael Iveson (Northern Ireland), Heehyun Jeong (South Korea), Koo Jeong A (South Korea), Banele Khoza (South Africa), Michael Kirkman (Great Britain), Thomas Kilpper(Germany), Elias Mung'ora (Kenya), Emma Nishimura (Canada), Octora (Indonesia), Kouseki Ono (Japan), Renata Papišta (Bosnia-Hercegovina), Srikanta Paul (India), Belkis Ramirez (Dominican Republic),Miriam Rudolph (Paraguay), Giancarlo Scaglia (Peru), Bahia Shehab (Lebanon/ Egypt), Shahzhia Sikander (Pakistan/ USA), Viktoria Wendel Skousen (Denmark), Puritip Suriyapatarapun (Thailand), Ephrem Solomon Tegegn (Ethiopia), Thammasin Darunkan (Thailand), Alexander Tovborg (Denmark), Tatu Tuominen (Finland), Nicolás Paris Veléz (Colombia)Marianne Vierø (Denmark), Lee Wagstaff (Great Britain), Bill Woodrow (Great Britain)
Award Winner 2016: Tauba Auerbach
Statement from the jury:
"The jury has been deeply impressed by Tauba Auerbach’s substantial body of work and the way that printmaking and graphic art are fully integrated into her artistic practice. In painting, prints, and artists’ books that are at once conceptually rigorous and visually lush, she focuses on abstract patterns – both random and ordered – to explore the structures of logic and perception. From aquatints that play with the dot patterns used in commercial printing; to screenprints whose abstract patterns she made by combining various typographic elements; to an elaborate pop-up book full of colorful three-dimensional geometries; to an artist’s book whose pages are printed with every possible color in the RBG color scale, her work is consistently engaged with the aesthetic, conceptual, and technical parameters of printing. Issues of reproduction, sequencing, and seriality, so fundamental to printmaking, are also at the heart of her vision.
In 2013 she established her own publishing imprint, Diagonal Press, which demonstrates her exceptional commitment to printmaking. The possibilities of publishing as a format in its own right allows Auerbach to maintain artistic autonomy and independent distribution while at the same time allowing her work to reach a broader audience, which is very much within the democratic tradition of printmaking."
Recipient of the Queen Sonja Print Award 2016: Tauba Auerbach
Nominees 2016
Karo Akporiere (Nigeria), Nazgol Ansarinia (Iran), Ewan Atkinson (Barbados), Tauba Auerbach (USA), Benjamin Badock (Germany), Jyotirmoy Dalapati (India), Boris Campos Ernst (Chile), Esther Fleckner (Denmark), Joscelyn E. Gardner (Barbados/Canada), Fuki Hamada (Japan), Johnny Hannah (UK), Samueli Heimonen (Finland), Joseph James (USA/Finland), Jussi Juurinen (Finland), Tom Kosmo (Norway), Katja Mater (Netherlands), Sabine Moritz (Germany), Jon Erik Nyholm (Denmark), Thom Ogonga (Kenya), Kyra Pape (South Africa), Praween Piangchoompu (Thailand), Liliana Porter (Argentine/USA), Julia Rommel (USA), Morten Schelde (Denmark), Andreas Siekmann (Germany), Slavs and Tartars (Eurasia), Josh Smith (USA), Kate Sweetapple (Australia), Elmar Vestner (Germany), Richard Woods (UK), Mojca Zlokarnik (Slovenia).
Award Winner 2014: Svend-Allan Sørensen
Statement from the jury:
"Svend-Allan Sørensen was born in 1975 and trained at the Academy of Fine Arts in Odense. He is represented at the National Arts Fund, Museum Jorn in Silkeborg, the ARoS Art Museum in Aarhus and several other Danish collections. He currently lives and works in Odense.
Svend-Allan Sørensen has been called a 'popular modernist'. A traditional graphic artist, he uses nature, especially birds, as a motif, but adds new, personal features both in the way he uses technology and in the content he chooses. It is as important to him to give associative descriptions of nature and birds as it is to depict them: Sørensen’s work contains many words as engraved images, words that represent both humorous and everyday philosophical statements. He moves effortlessly between established graphic techniques, celebrating craftsmanship while adding an ecologically romantic view of nature that is truly contemporary."
Recipient of the Queen Sonja Print Award 2014: Svend-Allan Sørensen
Nominees 2014
Cathrine Dahl and Ørjan Aas (Norway), Daniel Milan (Denmark), Mikael Kihlman (Sweden), Annu Vertanen (Finland), Valgerdur Hauksdòttir (Iceland), Minako Masui (Japan / Sweden), Ane Mette Hol (Norway), Hugleikur Dagsson (Iceland), Svend-Allan Sørensen (Denmark), Tuula Lehtinen (Finland), Vappu Johansson (Finland), Elina Sipilä (Finland), Adam Saks ( Denmark).
Award Winner 2012: Tiina Kivinen
Statement from the jury:
"Tiina Kivinen (born 1971) has for years devoted herself to the art of mezzotint. This is an intaglio printmaking technique dating back as far as 1650, and is seldom used by artists today. It is a time-consuming technique that is particularly suited to the production of nuances in black and grey tones.
Kivinen’s work is distinguished by the small size of her prints, which reflects the pace at which she works. After a plate has been used several times the artist often gives it a new life, changing it and using it in her subsequent work. Nature in a clear and minimalistic form has been and continues to be the central focus of Kivinen’s art. Her works pay deep homage to the Finnish landscape, and her most recent pieces have introduced humans into this landscape as explorers. The jury found it intriguing that Tiina Kivinen has chosen the mezzotint technique as her preferred medium, and remarked on how this technique and the pictorial content she focuses on bring a sense of mutualism and clarity to her work. The jury was also impressed by Kivinen’s high technical proficiency and her purposeful efforts, diligently crafted over an extended period of time."
Tiina Kivinen, "Bold Stockings", 2013
Mezzotint and drypoint
39 x 65 cm
Courtesy of the artist
Jury
To ensure its international impact, the Queen Sonja Print Award employs a broad-based nomination process for the Award every second year, inviting representatives of key institutions and organizations throughout the world to nominate artists for the prize. To award the world’s most prestigious prize within fine art printmaking, the Foundation recruits the art world’s visionaries to judge the awards. Our juries embody our commitment to honouring the most promising talent, and our dedication to the diversity and universality of graphic art.
Jury 2022
Rachel Kent
Rachel Kent is the recently appointed CEO of the Bundanon Trust, which will launch its new Art Museum and Bridge for Creative Learning in 2022. Prior to this, she was the Chief Curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art (MCA) Australia (2011-2021), leading its curatorial team, shaping the organisation’s artistic vision, and advocating for creative culture on national and international platforms.
Rachel has presented exhibitions in Australia, New Zealand, Japan, the United States and Canada, working with artists such as Yoko Ono, Grayson Perry, Yinka Shonibare MBE, Tatsuo Miyajima, David Goldblatt, Cornelia Parker and Doug Aitken. Her exhibitions have been presented at the Brooklyn Museum, New York; National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC; MCA San Diego; Musee d’art contemporain de Montreal; and the Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo.
Rachel sits on editorial, academic and government advisory panels, and speaks and publishes widely on modern and contemporary art. She is the editor and author of multiple award-winning artist monographs, working with Prestel, Phaidon and Thames & Hudson.
Pablo del Val
Pablo del Val (b. 1964) has decades of experience as a cultural manager, curator, and director of contemporary art galleries around the world.
For the last 6 years he has held the position of Artistic Director of Art Dubai. Art Dubai has been a major catalyst in the local, regional and international conversations on art from the Middle East and surrounding region (MENASA – Middle East, North Africa & South Asia), helping to put art from these territories onto the global map. As one of the world’s most international art fairs, Art Dubai has further expanded its commitment to cultivating a culture of discovery, offering exciting new global perspectives and broadening conversations about art beyond traditional western-led geographical scopes and narratives.
Previously del Val has held the position of Artistic Director of ZONA MACO, Mexico City International Contemporary Art Fair (2012 – 2015) as well as the Director at La Conservera, Centro de Arte Contemporáneo, Mucia, Spania (2009 – 2013).
Qiu Zhijie
Qiu Zhijie (b. 1969) is dean and professor at the School of Experimental Art at the Central Academy of Fine Arts, and professor of the School of Intermedia Art at China Academy of Art. As an artist, Qiu Zhijie is known for his calligraphy and ink painting, photography, video, installation and performance works. His art is representational of a new kind of experimental communication between the Chinese literati tradition and contemporary art, as well as social participation and the power of self-liberation within art. As an art writer, Qiu Zhijie has published several books including: The Image and Post Modernism (2002), Give Me a Mask (2003), The Limit of Freedom (2003), The Photography after Photography (2004), On Total Art (2012).
He was the curator of the first video art exhibition in China in 1996 and curated a series of “Post-sense Sensibility” exhibitions during 1999 and 2005 promoting the young generation of Chinese artists. In 2012 he was the chief curator of the 9th Shanghai Biennale “Reactivation”, and in 2017 the chief curator of the Chinese Pavilion of the 57th Venice Biennale. Qiu Zhijie was shortlisted for the Hugo Boss Prize administered by the Guggenheim Foundation due to his work of The Nanjing Yangtze River Bridge Project. He was awarded “Artist of the Year” at the Art China Awards in 2009 and was nominated for the same award in 2016.
His works are included in major museum collections and institutions around the world, including the Guggenheim Museum in NYC, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco, Foundation Louis Vuitton, Foundation by Christian Dior, Ullens Foundation, Neuer Berliner Kunstverein, and the White Rabbit Gallery in Sydney.
Previous Juries
- Emi Eu, Christopher Le Brun and Philip Tinari - 2020
- Lars Nittve, Mark Nash and Tauba Auerbach - 2018
- Starr Figura, Ute Meta Bauer and Martin Puryear - 2016
- HM Queen Sonja, Ian McKeever, Rasmus Urwald, Tiina Kivinen and Ole Larsen - 2014
- HM Queen Sonja, Ørnulf Opdahl, Kjell Nupen, Ole Larsen and Karin Hellandsjø - 2012
QSPA Inspirational Award
The QSPA Inspirational Award is awarded a Nordic artist who is currently pursuing, or has recently completed, his or her art education, and whose artistic practice makes active use of printmaking as an important means of expression. The grant is a collaboration between master printer Bill Goldston at Universal Limited Art Editions (ULAE) and the HM Queen Sonja Art Foundation, with the board of the Foundation serving as the jury.
The artists are nominated by the larger academies of art and the printmaking organisations in the Nordic countries, and the award is presented every other year.
The award was first introduced as the Kjell Nupen Memorial Grant in 2014, in commemoration of the Norwegian artist Kjell Nupen, who passed away earlier that year. The grant was renamed the QSPA Inspirational Award in 2018.
Recipients of the QSPA Inspirational Award:
- 2024: Maria Kayo Mpoyi
- 2022: Meerke Laimi Thomasson Vekterli, Norway
- 2020: Anna Pajak, Sweden
- 2017: Julie Ebbing, Norway
- 2015: Adam Saks, Denmark
Winners and Nominees
Award Winner 2024: Maria Kayo Mpoyi
Maria Kayo Mpoyi was born in 1986 in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo, and is a graduate of the Royal Institute of Art in Stockholm. Kayo Mpoyi combines visual art and literature in her artistic practice. She creatively interprets various fragments from archives, a practice she calls «inner archaeology». By weaving fictional stories around objects she finds in national and personal archives, Kayo Mpoyi strives to rediscover the past.
In every piece, she tries to write the autobiographies of her parents, grandparents, or those who came before. Their voices and stories seem lost since they are not recorded in texts or books. Her exploration has taught her that we carry within us remnants of all history. By finding different ways to make herself available to the encoded histories in our bodies, the fiction she weaves around objects and stories can carry understanding and rediscovery of the past.
She draws, carves, prints, writes, and repeats. This multiplying, repetitive process is hoped to generate a language or at least connect her to a cosmology she thought was lost to her. She works with archives, national archives such as museums and books, but mostly she turns to her own archive, such as her mother’s photo album or her father’s handwritten dictionary.
Maria Kayo Mpoyi has written two novels that explore the rediscovery of distorted history and the healing of trauma through fiction: "Mai Betyder Vatten" (2022) (to be released in Norwegian in August 2024 and published by Solum Bokvennen), "En Övning i Revolution" (2022), and the picture book "Kitoko" (2022).
The jury congratulate Maria Kayo Mpoyi on becoming the recipient of the QSPA Inspirational Award for 2024.
Award Winner 2022: Meerke Laimi Thomasson Vekterli
Meerke Vekterli (b. 1988) plays freely with shapes and patterns, textures and structures, composition and transparency.
More traditional techniques, insightfully rooted in the tradition of South Sámi arts and crafts, are explored and combined with more recent technical solutions. The photomechanical and the digital - such as photocopier prints, photopolymer printing, C-prints, and prints scanned through coloured transparent layers composed of various materials - are manipulated and edited, and reprocessed. At the same time, Vekterli is notably skilled in more traditional printing techniques such as woodcut and linocut. She clearly seeks out knowledge of technical processes and the qualities of the materials she uses, and has an extensive and strong material understanding. Taking nature and culture as her themes, Vekterli creates clear graphic structures and expressions. The results are subtle, unfolding previously unconceived and distinctive compositions and works.
The jury believes that Meerke Vekterli will significantly enjoy and benefit from a residency at renowned printing workshop Universal Limited Art Editions (ULAE). Her artistry already bears the hallmarks of exploration and experimentation, and a stay here will act as a catalyst for her further exploration of graphic techniques and future artistic development.
We congratulate Meerke Vekterli on becoming the recipient of the QSPA Inspirational Award for 2022.
Award Winner 2020: Anna Pajak
The QSPA Inspirational Award 2020 is being presented to the Swedish artist Anna Pajak (b. 1992).
Anna Pajak intermittently uses printmaking techniques, painting and text to inform her practice, drawing on the modernist esoteric movement to connect to a feminist take on image making and text production.
The jury is impressed by the artist’s spatial and geometrical explorations, the examination of surface, patterns, and depths; the way in which the formal language in her printmaking and painting interconnect, mutually informing one another. Colour and symbols, perspectives and imagery merge into almost futuristic entities where the abstract meets the figurative, and where the feminist spiritualist approach is re-forged into a contemporary language.
The Queen Sonja Art Foundation congratulates Anna Pajak on the QSPA Inspirational Award of 2020.
Nominees 2020
Winner of the 2017 Kjell Nupen Memorial Grant: Julie Ebbing
Statement from the jury:
"The core of Julie Ebbing’s artistic practice is woodcut. She combines this technique with installations, sculpture, embroidery, collage, found objects, performance and text. Ebbing injects raw energy into her graphic works. She is able to exploit the uniqueness of the woodcut technique within its given framework while at the same time creating new contexts. She draws on art history, and offers both political and social commentary in her works. Ebbing’s artistic practice is both relevant and innovative in terms of the medium and its thematic focus."
Julie Ebbing, Winner of Kjell Nupen Memorial Grant 2017
Photo: Tom Kolstad
Nominees 2017
Ellen Angus (Sweden/UK), Malou da Cunha Bang (Sweden), Patrik Berg (Norway), Jonas Silversten Bergman (Sweden), Jennifer Bergqvist (Sweden), Timothy Crisp (Sweden), Magnus Dahl (Sweden), Julie Ebbing (Norway), Timothy Eklund (Sweden), Leifur Ýmir Eyjólfsson (Iceland), Ester Fleckner (Denmark), Tova Fransson (Sweden), Sophia I. Gjerding (Denmark), Marija Griniuk (Denmark), Iina Heiskanen (Finland), Inma Herrera (Finland), Salad Hilowle (Sweden/ Somalia), Linda Hærnes (Norway), Holger Højbjerg (Denmark), Nina Knappe (Denmark), Natalia Koziel (Finland), Linus Krantz (Norway), Cathrine Liberg (Norway), Dina Lundvall (Sweden), Per Stian Monsås (Norway), Trond Nesheim (Norway), Jon Erik Nyholm (Denmark), Mari Oseland (Norway), Nína Óskarsdóttir (Iceland), Malin Nyheim Overholt (Norway), Elina Rantasuo (Finland), Johanne Rude Lindegaard (Denmark), Sigurður Atli Sigurðsson (Iceland), Johanne Dybdahl Sigvardsen (Denmark), Laura Vainikka (Denmark), Marie Vedel (Denmark).
Winner of the 2015 Kjell Nupen Memorial Grant: Adam Saks
Statement from the jury:
"Adam Saks trained at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen, Denmark, and Berlin University of the Arts in Germany. Adam Saks takes an enthusiastic and experimental approach to most printmaking techniques. He masters and embraces the unique forms of expression intrinsic to the various techniques, thereby transforming the technical limitations and potential of graphic art into something distinctive and personal. Mr Saks’s art lies in the tension between figuration and abstraction, and his works often have an ambiguous narrative. His works are featured in public collections in Denmark, Finland, Sweden and France.
In 2014, Adam Saks was one of 13 artists nominated for the Queen Sonja Print Award. Kjell Nupen himself nominated the young Danish artist."
Recipient of the Kjell Nupen Memorial Grant 2015: Adam Saks
QSPA Lifetime Achievement Award
The QSPA Lifetime Achievement Award was presented for the first time in 2018 and honors artists for their outstanding careers and lifelong dedication to graphic art and printmaking. The selection of the award recipient is made by the QSPA Board, and the award is presented bi-annually.
Recipients of the QSPA Lifetime Achievement Award:
- 2024: Anselm Kiefer
- 2022: William Kentridge, South Africa
- 2020: Paula Rego, Portugal/UK
- 2018: David Hockney, UK
QSPA Lifetime Achievement Award
Award Winner 2024: Anselm Kiefer
HM Queen Sonja said: "It is a great honour for the QSPA board to present Anselm Kiefer with the Lifetime Achievement Award for his distinguished contribution to the art of printmaking through a long and outstanding career."
Anselm Kiefer’s monumental body of work represents a microcosm of collective memory, visually encapsulating a broad range of cultural, literary, and philosophical allusions—from the Old and New Testaments, Kabbalah mysticism, Norse mythology and Wagner’s Ring Cycle to the poetry of Ingeborg Bachmann and Paul Celan. Born during the closing months of World War II, Kiefer reflects upon Germany’s postwar identity and history, grappling with the national mythology of the Third Reich. Fusing art and literature, painting and sculpture, Kiefer engages the complex events of history and the ancestral epics of life, death, and the cosmos. His boundless repertoire of imagery is paralleled only by the breadth of media palpable in his work.
Kiefer’s oeuvre encompasses paintings, vitrines, installations, artist books, and an array of works on paper such as drawings, watercolours, collages, and altered photographs. The physical elements of his practice—from lead, concrete, and glass to textiles, tree roots, and burned books—are as symbolically resonant as they are vast ranging. By integrating, expanding, and regenerating imagery and techniques, he brings to light the importance of the sacred and spiritual, myth and memory.
Anselm Kiefer was born in 1945 in Donaueschingen, Germany. After studying law and Romance languages, he attended the School of Fine Arts at Freiburg im Breisgau and the Art Academy in Karlsruhe while maintaining a contact with Joseph Beuys.
Kiefer’s work has been shown and collected by major museums worldwide, including the following: “Bilder und Bücher,” Kunsthalle Bern, Switzerland (1978); “Verbrennen, verholzen, versenken, versanden,” West German Pavilion, 39th Biennale di Venezia, Italy (1980); “Margarete—Sulamith,” Museum Folkwang, Germany (1981); Kunsthalle Düsseldorf, Germany (1984, traveled to ARC Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, France; and Israel Museum, Jerusalem); “Peintures 1983–1984,” Musée d’Art Contemporain, Bordeaux (1984); and Art Institute of Chicago, Illinois (1987, traveled to Philadelphia Museum of Art, Pennsylvania; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; and Museum of Modern Art, New York, through 1989).
Further museum exhibitions include “Bücher 1969–1990,” Kunsthalle Tübingen, Germany (1990, traveled to Kunstverein München, Germany; and Kunsthaus Zürich, Switzerland, through 1991); Neue Nationalgalerie Berlin, Germany (1991); “Melancholia,” Sezon Museum of Art, Tokyo (1993, traveled to Kyoto National Museum of Art, Japan; and Hiroshima Museum of Contemporary Art, Japan); “Himmel-Erde,” Museo Correr, Venice (1997); and “El viento, el tiempo, el silencio,” Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid (1998). In recent years, Anselm Kiefer’s solo exhibitions have included Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, Spain (2000); “Maleri 1998–2000,” Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Humlebkæk, Denmark (2001); “Die sieben Himmelspaläste,“ Fondation Beyeler, Basel (2001); “I sette palazzi celesti,” Fondazione Pirelli, Milan (2004); “Heaven and Earth,” Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, Texas (2005, traveled to Musée d’Art Contemporain de Montréal, Québec; Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington D.C.; and San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, California, through 2007); Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, Spain (2007); “Sternenfall / Chute d’étoiles,” Monumenta, Grand Palais, Paris (2007); “Anselm Kiefer au Louvre,” Musée du Louvre, Paris (2007); Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Humlebkæk, Denmark (2010); “Shevirat Hakelim,” Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Israel (2011); “Beyond Landscape,” Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo (2013); Royal Academy of Arts, London (2014); “l’alchimie du livre,” Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Paris (2015); Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris (2015); “Kiefer Rodin,” Musée Rodin, Paris (2017, traveled to the Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia, through 2018); “For Velimir Khlebnikov — Fates of Nations,” State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg (2017); and “Provocations,” The Met Breuer, New York (2017); “Uraeus,” Rockefeller Center, New York (2018); “Livres et xylographies,” Fondation Jan Michalski, Montricher, Switzerland (2019); “Bøker og tresnitt,” Astrup Fearnley Museum, Oslo (2019); “Anselm Kiefer à La Tourette,” Couvent de La Tourette, Éveux, France (2019); “Hommage à Maurice Genevoix,” Panthéon, Paris (2020 ongoing); “Pour Paul Celan,” Grand Palais Éphémère, Paris (2021); “Anselm Kiefer These writings, when burned, will finally cast a little light (Andrea Emo)”, Doge’s Palace, Venice, Italy (2022); “Anselm Kiefer, Finnegans Wake”, White Cube, London, UK (2023); “Herbst”, Heredium, Daejeon, South Korea (2023); “Anselm Kiefer. La photographie au commencement”, LaM, Villeneuve d’Ascq, France (2023); “Anselm Kiefer. Fallen Angels”, Palazzo Strozzi, Florence, Italy (2024).
Award Winner 2022: William Kentridge
William Kentridge (b. 1955) – a student of political science as well as fine art in the 1970s – started in the field of printmaking by creating screen-printed posters for trade unions, student protests and theatre companies. The artist has since continued to investigate notions of politics and philosophy, with a wide spectre of printmaking techniques where he displays a mastery of the craft and outstanding draughtsmanship.
In his works he plays with multiple lines and sequential progressions, juxtaposing text and image, working with contrasts of black ink against white paper. Questions of identity, dislocation, memory, and perception, are often set against the social and political landscape of South Africa’s past and present. His prints are filled with ambiguities and contradictions, exploring what is purportedly civilized and rational.
Award Winner 2020: Paula Rego
The Lifetime Achievement Award is a celebration of an artist’s career and lifetime contribution to graphic art and printmaking. The 2020 Award goes to one of Europe’s most influential contemporary figurative artists. She is celebrated for her ambiguous complex compositions in paintings, drawings, and collages, as well as prints. Throughout her career, printmaking has been a space for exploration, and a fundamental part of her artistic oeuvre. Through her technical prowess, the artist has been in dialogue with the particularities of different printing techniques, matching and expanding upon them to interlock with her unique mode of expression.
Paula Rego (b. 1935 in Lisbon, Portugal) explores complex subject matters; psychologically charged depictions of human dramas and narratives. She depicts dysfunctional family relations, political systems, and social structures. Female perspectives are often at the forefront both thematically and compositionally. Novels, poems, nursery rhymes and fairy tales are reinterpreted in her prints, underlined by unconventional compositional devices. Extraordinary lithographs, intaglio- and screen prints are often produced in series. Their themes are many-faceted and detailed, open to the viewers’ interpretations. Paula Rego plays with both the expected and unexpected; disregarding scale and linear time, while at the same time juxtaposing important and less important pictorial elements. Rego’s work can be be viewed in the light of Francisco Goya and William Hogarth, where prints are used as political and social commentary, yet in their execution and exuberance they are highly original and modern.
It is a great honor for the QSPA board to present Paula Rego with the second Lifetime Achievement Award for her distinguished contribution to the art of printmaking through a long and outstanding career.
Paula Rego, "Good Morning", 1988
Etching and aquatint
Sheet 36.5 x 45 cm
Edition of 50
Courtesy Paula Rego and Cristea Roberts Gallery, London
©️ Paula Rego
Award Winner 2018: David Hockney
The Lifetime Achievement Award is a celebration of an artist’s career and lifetime contribution to graphic art and printmaking. The 2018 Award goes to an artist who has been an important figure on the international art scene for many decades. He is one of the most popular and influential British artists of the 20th century. The winner is not only critically acclaimed as a painter and sophisticated printmaker, but also widely appreciated as a skillful draughtsman, technical innovator, photographer, and stage designer.
David Hockney (b. 1937) made his first prints as a student in 1954 and has since created a large body of exquisite works in traditional printmaking techniques, such as etchings and lithography, as well as experimenting with “homemade” prints; using photocopies and faxes, and computer drawings. Printmaking and the restless investigation of new mediums and different techniques, has for Hockney, been an integral part of his examination and fascination with formal challenges, exploration of the spatial ideas of perspective, and the dialogue between abstraction and the figural. The artist’s technical mastery and lifelong experiments in printmaking has expanded the possibilities and our understanding of this field.
It is a great honour for the QSPA board to present David Hockney with the first Lifetime Achievement Award for his distinguished contribution to the art of printmaking.
