8 December 2010
Graduate is the sole winner of £10,000 art competition
A Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design graduate is celebrating after winning £10,000 when she was challenged to put her best foot forward.
Jane Forbes (47), who lives in Crail, graduated from the Master of Fine Art programme at DJCAD, part of the University of Dundee, last month. She won £10,000 after being awarded first prize in ‘The Shoe is Art’, a competition organised by shoe designer and retailer Dune to reflect their pop art-inspired Autumn/Winter campaign imagery.
Jane wowed the judges with her installation, ‘Ad Infinitum...’, which she had displayed at the Dundee Masters Show earlier this year. Her installation, described as 'awe-inspiring', will be unveiled at Dune’s flagship Covent Garden store on Friday when Jane will travel to London to receive her prize from the company’s Executive Chairman Daniel Rubin on Friday.
'Ad Infinitum...' saw Jane paint the same pair of shoes each day for 66 days. Each day she started afresh, without reference to any of the previous paintings, meaning each is subtly, or in some cases, not so subtly, different depending on a number of other variables.
She considered the presence of an empty garment in the absence of its wearer, and to investigate shoes and the stories that they tell. Jane asked whether a painted pair of shoes which encapsulate the essence of their owner, should be considered a still life or a portrait.
The concept, along with Jane’s beautiful painting skills and technique, won the admiration of the competition judges, including highly respected art experts and representatives of Dune.
Jane says that she is 'genuinely thrilled' to have won the prize, and that the money will be used to support her artistic practice.
'This is an absolutely fantastic prize for me to win,' she said. 'Having just completed your Masters, you think about what’s next but this is a massive boost that will support me as I try to establish myself as an artist.
'Ad Infinitum was a work that began to evolve as I started the process of painting the shoes each day. Every time I turned the page and began again. In the digital age, it would have been easy to do one painting and make exact copies, but that wasn’t what this work was about.
'It was more of an exercise in painting, and the fact art is a process rather than exact science. The result is that every picture is that little bit different. Some days, the boots would be much darker or lighter than others, and the finished product would reflect my mood on each of the 66 days.'
Jane worked as a primary school teacher for many years, before fulfilling a life’s ambition to study art. She graduated with a BA (Hons) Fine Art from DJCAD in 2005, and worked as an art teacher before being awarded the William Sangster Philips of Scholarship for merit 2009-2010, which enabled her to fund her Masters course.
Her paintings have been chosen to appear in several prestigious exhibitions, and she has also hosted several solo exhibitions at galleries across the UK.
Notes to editors:
For more information about the competition, please see www.dune.co.uk/catwalk/art.asp.
To contact Jane, call 07773786655, or email janeforbes@hotmail.co.uk.
Examples of her work can be found at www.janeforbes.co.uk.
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University of Dundee
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