24 June 2010
Mary gets a buzz from wasps award
Photo opportunity: 2pm on Thursday, June 24th at City Square. Mary Somerville will be available for pictures before receiving her degree.
Artist Mary Somerville, who is set to graduate from Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design today, has been named as the winner of this year’s Wasps/PPG New Graduate Prize in Dundee.
The award means that Mary is entitled to a year’s free use of studio space in Meadow Mill, which has housed Wasp’s artists’ studios in Dundee since 1989.
Mary’s undergraduate studies at DJCAD, part of the University of Dundee, recently came to an end with a critically acclaimed exhibit at the 2010 Dundee Degree Show. She will graduate with a First Class Degree in Fine Art from DJCAD at 2.30pm on Thursday, June 24th.
The Prize will allow her to continue creating her unique sculpted animations, which proved one of the highlights of the Degree Show. Using stop-motion animation techniques, the clay creatures that Mary made were used to examine the relationship between a being and its surroundings.
The Wasps/PPG New Graduate Prize is the latest in a lengthening line of accolades for Mary’s work in her short career to date. Earlier this year she won a £2,000 RSA John Kinross Scholarship for a study tour to Florence, which she will undertake after graduation.
The twenty-six-year-old is originally from the Inverness area and moved to Dundee to study and, on the strength of her Degree Show exhibit, she has already been selected to display her work at the prestigious Royal Scottish Academy and Society of Scottish Artists’ exhibitions in the next year.
Mary said the Wasps/PPG New Graduate Prize and free use of studio space for a year was an excellent boost at a crucial time in her career.
'This means that, when I come back from Florence - where I plan to conduct a period of research - I will have a space in which I can use the sketches and ideas I have gathered to make new work,' she said.
'Having the wasps studio space free of charge for a year is an amazing opportunity for me to continue making work after graduation. With the scale of the sets and the space I need to make the films, my work is not the kind I can make in a corner of my bedroom, so having a studio is really important for me to keep working.
'Next year I have a couple of exhibitions with the RSA New Contemporaries and SSA where I will mostly be showing the degree show work, but I will also be looking for opportunities to show new work next year, and would like to explore the ongoing journey, through sets and animations, further.'
Wasps Artists' Studios is an award-winning charity which provides affordable studio space to support the careers of up to 750 visual artists working in Scotland today.
Over the past 30 years, the organisation has grown to become one of the largest studio providers in the UK with a network of 17 buildings from the Borders to the Shetlands.
Helen Moore, Communications and Tenant Liason Officer for Wasps, congratulated Mary for the quality and ambition of her work and said she was a worthy winner of the Prize.
'The selection panel were hugely impressed by the ambition of Mary’s work and are very much looking forward to following and supporting her development over the coming year,' she said.
'Her work is absolutely incredible and when we saw it the instant reaction was that this was work that we hadn’t seen anything like before.
'We currently have a waiting list for studio space in Dundee and this Prize is a way of getting young artists into the studio and keeping this talent in Dundee. Encouraging the best young artists in Scotland is the whole idea behind the Prize and Mary is exactly the type of talent we are trying to help.'
Redevelopment work to improve the fabric of the building and to install a lift and heating at Wasps’ Dundee premises will commence towards the end of the year. Wasps are also planning to convert the fourth floor of the building to create even more studio spaces for artists in Dundee.
Two other graduates will also be awarded the New Graduate Prize in Edinburgh and Glasgow. The prize is supported by the property investment and development company PPG. The Edinburgh-based firm will fund the cost of providing professional studio accommodation for three young artists in Scotland for a year.
Notes to editors:
The aims of Wasps are to: Support, sustain and develop Scotland's community of visual artists.
Provide a national network of working spaces, and other low cost services, to artists and arts organisations.
Increase access to studio facilities by establishing new facilities across the country and improving access for people with disabilities.
Support artist-led public events within the company's buildings to provide professional opportunities for artists and break down barriers between artists and the wider public.
Improve the professional & economic status of visual artists, and help ensure that Scotland continues to be a centre for excellence in the visual arts and a good location to base a career as a practising artist.
Anyone who would like to register for studio space in Dundee can contact Wasps on 0141 553 5890
or info@waspsstudios.org.uk.
For media enquiries contact:
Grant Hill
Press Officer
University of Dundee
Nethergate, Dundee, DD1 4HN
TEL: 01382 384768
E-MAIL: g.hill@dundee.ac.uk
MOBILE: 07854 953277 |
