The Vincent Award 2014

The Gemeentemuseum The Hague is proud to present work by the five artists shortlisted for the Vincent Award in an exhibition entitled The Vincent Award 2014. The purpose of the award is to spur on a mid-career artist whose work is appreciably influencing the development of contemporary art in Europe. An expert jury has short-listed five artists for the prize: Pierre Huyghe, Manfred Pernice, Willem de Rooij, Anri Sala and Gillian Wearing. Work by these artists is seldom seen in the Netherlands, but will now be on show at the GEM, Museum of Contemporary Art, from 6 September 2014 through 1 February 2015.

On 21 November the Gemeentemuseum will reveal at an award ceremony whether Pierre Huyghe (France), Manfred Pernice (Germany), Willem de Rooij (the Netherlands), Anri Sala (Albania/France) or Gillian Wearing (United Kingdom) has won the Vincent Award. Prior to that, an exhibition of their work will be on show at the GEM, Museum of Contemporary Art, from 6 September. The candidates’ oeuvre is highly diverse and of outstanding quality, showing that even in a globalised society, European artists have lost nothing of their vigour or influence. Never before has work by these artists been brought together on show in the Netherlands.

Existing and new work  

The exhibition will showcase both existing and new work. Willem de Rooij will be creating a new installation inspired by one of the Mondrians in the Gemeentemuseum’s permanent collection. Manfred Pernice will be showing his sculptural work and Pierre Huyghe one of his most recent films. Anri Sala will be designing a new installation of existing video works and, alongside a film and highlights of her photographic oeuvre, Gillian Wearing will be presenting a new photo work created in 2014.

The Vincent Award

The Vincent Award was founded in 2000 by the Broere Foundation in memory of Monique Zajfen, a beloved friend of the Broere family and former owner of ‘Gallery 121’ in Antwerp, Belgium.

It was her commitment to and passion for contemporary art that inspired this move to spur on European artists of great talent. The Vincent Award is intended both to encourage European talent and to promote communication in a free, united and peaceful Europe. The winner of the prize receives a sum of EUR 50,000.

Monique Zajfen Collection

This year, the Gemeentemuseum will be hosting the award ceremony for the first time. The collaboration between the Broere Foundation and the Gemeentemuseum will continue until 2020, and will entail the Monique Zajfen Collection being on long-term loan to the Gemeentemuseum. It is one of the most significant private collections of contemporary art in the Netherlands, featuring works by three previous winners of the Vincent Award – Pawel Althamer, Neo Rauch and Wilhelm Sasnal – as well as artists like Marlene Dumas, Luc Tuymans, Thomas Schütte and Stephan Balkenhol.

About the artists:

Pierre Huyghe (1962, Paris, France) lives and works in Paris and New York, and studied at the Ecole nationale supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. He has already won a number of awards, including a DAAD Prize in Berlin (1999-2000), the Guggenheim Museum’s Hugo Boss Prize (2002), the Smithsonian Museum’s Contemporary Artist Award (2010) and the Roswitha Haftmann Award (2013). Huyghe has had solo exhibitions at Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven (2001), the Guggenheim Museum and DIA Center for the Arts, New York (2003), Castello di Rivoli Museum d’Arte Contemporanea, Turin (2004), Tate Modern, London (2006), Museo Nacional Centro de Art Reina Sofia, Madrid (2010), Centre Pompidou, Paris (2013-2014) and Museum Ludwig, Cologne (2014).

Manfred Pernice (Born 1963, Hildesheim, Germany) lives and works in Berlin. He studied Graphics and Sculpture in Braunschweig and at Hochschule der Künste in Berlin. Major solo exhibitions include Portikus Frankfurt am Main (2000), Kunsthalle Zürich (2000), Witte de With, Rotterdam (2000), Museum Ludwig, Cologne (2007), Modern Art, Oxford (2010), Secession, Vienna (2010), S.M.A.K. – Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst, Ghent (2011), Institut d’Art contemporain, Villeurbanne (2013) and Haus der Kunst, Munich (2013).

Willem de Rooij (1969, Beverwijk, The Netherlands) lives and works in Berlin. He studied art history at the University of Amsterdam and art at the Gerrit Rietveld Academie and the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam. De Rooij received the Bâloise Art Prize in 2000, a Robert Fulton-fellowship at Harvard University in 2004 and a DAAD Stipend in 2006-2007. He represented the Netherlands at the Venice Biennale in 2005 and is Professor of Fine Arts at the Städelschule in Frankfurt am Main since 2006. Important solo exhibitions include The ICA, London (2002), Kunsthalle Zürich (2004), K 21, Düsseldorf (2007), Museo d’Arte Moderna di Bologna (2008), Neue Nationalgalerie, Berlin (2010), Kunstverein München (2012) and The Jewish Museum, New York (2014).

Anri Sala (Born 1974, Tirana, Albania) lives and works in Berlin. He studied painting at the National Academy of Arts in Tirana and film at Le Fresnoy - Studio National des Arts Contemporains, Tourcoing. He won the Young Artist Prize at La Biennale di Venezia (2001) and the Absolut Art Award (2011). His recent solo shows include Serpentine Gallery London (2011), Japan National Museum of Art, Osaka (2011), Museum of Contemporary Art, Detroit (2012), Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin (2012), Palazzo Grassi Teatrino, La Biennale di Venezia (2013).

Gillian Wearing (Born 1963, Birmingham, UK) lives and works in London. She studied at Chelsea School of Art and at Goldsmith’s College in London. Gillian Wearing won the Turner Prize in 1997. She was appointed a Royal Academician in 2007. Among her major solo shows are Serpentine Gallery, London (2000), Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago (2002), ICA, Philadelphia (2003), Frans Hals Museum, Haarlem (2004), Ikon Gallery, Birmingham (2006), K20 Grabbeplatz, Düsseldorf (2012), Whitechapel Art Gallery, London (2012), Museum Brandhorst, Munich (2013).

About the jury

The artists were nominated by a jury of European experts. The Vincent Award jury for 2014 comprises Benno Tempel, director of the Gemeentemuseum (chair); Stephan Berg, director of the Kunstmuseum Bonn; Isabel Carlos, director of the Centro del Art Moderna, Gulbekian Foundation, Lisbon; Anda Rottenberg, independent art critic and curator; and Anita Zabludowicz, co-founder of the Zabludowicz Collection, London, New York and Sarvisalo. They selected the five candidates from a longlist of artists nominated by a group of European experts from the contemporary art world: Fabio Cavallucci, director of the Centre for Contemporary Art, Ujazdowski Castle, Warsaw; Adam Szymczyk, artistic director, Documenta 14; Nataša Petrešin-Bachelez, independent curator; Mirjam Varadinis, curator at the Kunsthaus Zürich; Holger Liebs, editor in chief of Monopol Magazin für Kunst und Leben; Tom Morton, independent curator, London; WHW (What How, for Whom) curators’ collective from Zagreb; Xander Karskens, curator at De Hallen, Haarlem; and Nicolaus Schafhausen, director of the Kunsthalle in Vienna.