KONSTA ACADEMY AWARDS, REWARDS AND SCHOLARSHIPS 2021
Kristina Eriksson, Call me flower, 2020, oil on canvas, 85 x 72 cm.
KRISTINA ERIKSSON
has been awarded the Carl Christensen and Maria Ekman Stiftelse prize to deserving artists with the justification:
Kristina Eriksson has a voice all her own. From the seemingly simple note, the artist forms an extended and striking moment. Paint over and peel away until only the essentials remain. But even what is painted over and gone, what we have never seen, still vibrates in the image as a deep experience. It is fragile, hard and strongly touching.
Cecilia Elde, Déjà Vu, 2010, oil on mdf panel, 37 x 40 cm. Photo: Per-Erik Adamsson.
CECILIA ELDE
has been awarded the Carl Christensen and Maria Ekman Stiftelse prize to deserving artists with the justification:
Cecilia Elde's wayward and dream-influenced painting is solid and radiates a strong understanding of her own consciousness and that of others. It is a virtuoso craft. The artist finds the most unexpected, peculiar and original angles both in his own and others' artistry. She enriches painting in an absolutely unique way, which is of great importance in our time.
Carlos Capelán, A walk in the fields, 2020, shelf, pile of books, stone and acrylic on canvas, 142 x 178 cm. The Art Council's collection.
CARLOS CHAPELÁN
has been awarded the Augusta, Oscar and Harry Höckerts Höckerts prize:
for a versatile and nomadic artistry, hungry for answers beyond the predictable, and which early introduced post-colonial perspectives into Swedish artistic life. From works, where the choice to put a visual story on top of something that already carries a story, the paradoxical and multi-rooted in our existence is lifted. To works that force the laws of perspective, switch places between "seeing" and "being seen" and set the viewer's ideas in motion.
Karin Granqvist, without title, oil on canvas,
180 x 240 cm. Photo Leon Bethke 2020.
KARIN GRANQVIST
is awarded Paul Hedqvist's reward with the justification:
Karin Granqvist's approach is to draw but with colour. As in a calligraphic clarity, her feather-light lines flow with the heavy oil paint. It is a meeting between bodily density and floating weightlessness. She waits for the moment and then lays the line; never paint over, just add. With the same determination as a farmer plowing the field, she places her signs above the surface, concrete and at the same time wonderfully ambiguous.
Anastasia Ax, The world as of yesterday, 2015, paper and ink. Neues Museum, Nuremberg. Faber Castell International Drawing Award 2015. Photo Anette Kradisch.
ANASTASIA AX
has been awarded the Axel Theofron Sandberg watercolor prize:
for her fearlessness and unreserved empathy. In symbiosis with the material, the artist develops the work where the body becomes a tool in a performance around power structures, pain and introverted violence. Black and light mix eruptively. It is powerful, physical and compelling.
Mary Hall, Memo, watercolor monotype, 2020, 19 x 24 cm. Private photo.
MARY HALL
has been awarded the Axel Theofron Sandberg watercolor prize:
for a vibrant nature-lyrical painting that gravitates towards an abstract simplification. In seemingly fragile motifs rests a blackness and a sadness. Her painting echoes with notes from romanticism and symbolism, but the peculiar flora the artist evokes is only her own.
Martin Jacobson, Picnic X, 2020, watercolour.
MARTIN JACOBSON
has been awarded the Axel Theofron Sandberg watercolor prize:
for his colorful imaginative paintings. In his painting, emotional experiences, popular cultural references, color and light phenomena are mixed. It is driven, theatrical and at the same time fine-tuned and tender. In Martin Jacobsson's world, the unfamiliar can create recognition and the familiar a new alien form. Myths, dreams and collective image memories, combined with a feeling for psychedelic color clashes, form an artistry where the viewer feels as foreign as at home.
Carola Grahn, Facade, Wall, 2020. Birch wood. Photo Hendrik Zeitel.
CAROLA GRAHN
has been awarded the Asmund and Lizzie Arles sculptor prize with the justification:
Between society and individual, nature and culture, city and country, we find Carola Grahn's art and research. In her examination of the gap between how society sees her and how she perceives herself and the world, she makes us see ourselves and the roles we play. Her installations are both physically tangible and conceptual. A large pile of wood can be called "Wall" while a poem can highlight what it is to be human with the words "The most Sami thing I have is the pain.".
Bigert & Bergström, Rescue blanket for Kebnekaise, 2016. Photo Studio Bigert & Bergström.
MATS BIGERT AND LARS BERGSTRÖM
has been awarded the Göran Lagervall prize with the justification:
For more than thirty years, Bigert & Bergström have continuously strived to investigate the intersection between man, nature and technology, with results of large-scale technologically advanced installations, public sculptures and film. Their diverse approach, curiosity, humor and inclusive methods involve the viewer in thought and sensory experiences and interactive experiments.
Niki Lindroth von Bahr, still image from Something to remember, 2019, animated movie.
NIKI LINDROTH VON BAHR
has been awarded the Hans and Desy Viksten scholarship to artists working in the spirit of Hans Viksten:
for her tenderly and meticulously produced stop-motion films, where every familiar detail is recreated in miniature but inhabited by call center monkeys, sad herrings, mice, snails and llamas. They all find themselves in different kinds of breathless situations of ordinariness where all attempts at escape collapse against a relentless reality without the redemptive catharsis of the fairy tale. We know how it feels, the unfiltered slow everydayness.
Hi Kanthi, Cars In My Neighborhood, 2020, polaroid, 29 x 33 cm.
CIA KANTHI JONSSON
has been awarded the Vera and Göran Agnekil scholarship with the justification:
Memory, what we remember and what we may not want to see or remember, is portrayed in a wayward way in Cia Kanthi Jonsson's objects, photographs and videos. An object carries a story which is traded and brings memories to life. She takes the viewer into a world with many facets which reflect our world in a kaleidoscopically varied way.
Alejandro Montero Bravo, Confide in me, 2020, varnish, artificial leather, rope, eyelet, steel fittings, angle iron, wood.
ALEJANDRO MONTERO BRAVO
has been awarded the Vera and Göran Agnekil scholarship with the justification:
Alejandro Montero Bravo's creations redefine Western norms of aesthetics, beauty, taste and social behavior with materialisations, questions and bold expressions. With a scholarship that wants to pave the way for the development of a young, talented artist.
Patrik Andiné, Make over, 2019, oil on panel, 37 x 37 cm.
PATRIK ANDINÉ
has been awarded the Uno Troilis scholarship:
for an artistry with sharpness, humor and warmth in a bright defiance of reality.
Lena Johansson, The Highest Form of Hope II, 2020, oil and gesso on found disc from skate park.
LENA JOHANSSON
has been awarded Nisse Zetterberg's Rome scholarship and Martha Larsson's Rome scholarship with the justification:
Lena uses the sensualizing properties of painting to capture a certain light, a specific beauty, but there is also a sense of voyeurism and warning. Through the attractive imagery of advertising, we as viewers become aware of our gaze. It evokes a sense of recognition and a greed; After the power of the fleeting moment, the heightened memories evoked, the youth wasted on the young and the eternal epicness of it all.
Annika Ekdahl, Medal Ceremony: Thanks for everything! (From the suite Mammal Stories), 2020, tapestry technique, 1,5 mx 2,25 m. Photo Göran Lidén.
ANNIKA EKDAHL
has been awarded Inez Leander's award for outstanding female artist with the justification:
Textile artist Annika Ekdal creates large-scale woven wallpapers in a mix of Renaissance and Baroque styles. She actualizes an ancient art form by bringing modern storytelling into an old technique. Borrowing from a thousand-year tradition of historical tapestries, the contemporary is woven into depictions of people from today's life and society.
ANNIVERSARY DAY 2022
Top row from left: Martin Jacobson, Cia Kanthi Jonsson, Carola Grahn, Niki Lindroth von Bahr, Maria Hall, Annika Ekdahl.
Bottom row from left: Lena Johansson, Alejandro Montero Bravo, Karin Granqvist, Permanent Secretary Isabella Nilsson, President Helena Tallius Myhrman, Vice President Klara Kristalova, Kristina Eriksson, Anastasia Ax, Cecilia Elde. Photo: Björn Strömfeldt / Art Academy.