Turner Prize

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The Turner Prize is an annual prize given to a British visual artist under 50, named after the painter J.M.W. Turner. It is organized by the Tate, and since its beginnings in 1984 it has become the United Kingdom's most publicised art award. The prize fund in 2004 was £40,000.

1 Introduction
2 Criticism of the Turner Prize
3 List of winners and shortlisted artists
4 External links
5 Trivia
6 See also
7 References

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Introduction

Each year during the build-up to the announcement of the winner, the Prize receives intense attention from the media. Much of this attention is critical and the question is often asked, "is this art?".<ref name=art1>"Head to Head: Turner Prize – Is It Art?" BBC, December 2, 1999Retrieved March 22, 2006</ref><ref name=art2>"Turner Prize: Is It Art? BBC, November 4, 2002 Retrieved March 22, 2006</ref> The artists usually work in "innovative" media, including video art, installation art and unconventional sculpture, though painters have also won.

Nominations for the prize are invited from the public, although this is widely considered to have negligible effect. Typically, there is a three-week period in May for public nominations to be received; the short-list (which since 1991 has been of four artists) is announced in July; a show of the nominees' work opens at Tate Britain in late October; and the prize itself is announced at the beginning of December. The show stays open till January. The prize is not judged on the show, however, but on the artists' contribution to art over the previous year.

The exhibition and prize rely on commercial sponsorship. From 1987 this was provided by the company Drexel Burnham Lambert; their withdrawal led to the 1990 prize being cancelled. Channel 4, an independent television channel, stepped in for 1991, doubled the prize money to £20,000, and supported the event with documentaries and live broadcasts of the prize-giving. In 2004 they were replaced as sponsors by Gordon's gin, who also doubled the prize money to £40,000, with £5,000 going to each of the shortlisted artists, and £25,000 to the winner.

As much as the shortlist of artists reflects the state of British Art, the composition of the panel of judges provides some indication of who holds influence institutionally and internationally, as well as rising stars. Tate Director Sir Nicholas Serota has been the Chair of the jury since his tenure at the Tate. There are conflicting reports as to how much personal sway he has over the proceedings.

The media success of the Turner Prize contributed to the success of the late 1990s phenomena of Young British Artists (several of whom were nominees and winners), Cool Britannia, and exhibitions such as the Charles Saatchi-sponsored Sensation exhibition.

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Criticism of the Turner Prize

The Evening Standard critic Brian Sewell, wrote "The annual farce of the Turner Prize is now as inevitable in November as is the pantomime at Christmas".

Critic Jonathan Jones, wrote: "Turner Prize art is based on a formula where something looks startling at first and then turns out to be expressing some kind of banal idea, which somebody will be sure to tell you about. The ideas are never important or even really ideas, more notions, like the notions in advertising. Nobody pursues them anyway, because there's nothing there to pursue." <ref>The Guardian</ref>

In 1993, Jimmy Cauty and Bill Drummond of the K Foundation received media coverage for the award of the "Anti-Turner Prize", £40,000 to be given to the "worst artist in Britain", voted from the real Turner Prize's short-list. Rachel Whiteread, who won the real prize, also won the anti-Turner Prize. She refused to accept the money at first, but changed her mind when she heard the cash was to be burned instead, and gave £30,000 of it to artists in financial need and the other £10,000 to the housing charity, Shelter. The K Foundation went on to make a film in which they burned £1 million of their own money.

In 1999 two artists, Jian Jun Xi and Yuan Cai, jumped onto Tracey Emin's work, My Bed, stripped to their underwear, and had a pillow fight. Police detained the two, who called their performance Two Naked Men Jump Into Tracey's Bed. They claimed that her work had not gone far enough, and that they were improving it. Charges were not pressed against them.

In 1999 a pro-painting group of artists known as the Stuckists was formed. They show particular antipathy towards the Turner Prize, describing it as an "ongoing national joke" and "a state-funded advertising agency for Charles Saatchi"; they continue: "the only artist who wouldn't be in danger of winning the Turner Prize is Turner", concluding that it "should be re-named The Duchamp Award for the destruction of artistic integrity". They have demonstrated outside the prize, sometimes dressed as clowns, every year since 2000, and gained considerable publicity.

The art critic David Lee has argued that since the re-organisation of the prize in 1991 the shortlist has been dominated by artists represented by a small number of London dealers, namely Nicholas Logsdail of the Lisson Gallery, and others closely linked to the collector Charles Saatchi: Jay Jopling, Maureen Paley and Victoria Miro. The Lisson Gallery has had the most success of any gallery with the Turner Prize from 1991 to 2004.

In 2002 culture minister Kim Howells pinned the following statement to a board in a room specially-designated for visitors' comments. "If this is the best British artists can produce then British art is lost. It is cold mechanical, conceptual bullshit. Kim Howells. P.S. The attempts at conceptualisation are particularly pathetic and symptomatic of a lack of conviction" His stance was approved by the government, who saw it as a popular one.

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List of winners and shortlisted artists

The 1988 shortlist was not published at the time of the prize, and there was no shortlist as such in 1989, although a number of artists other than the winner were "commended".