This year’s Turner Prize announcement was never going to be business as usual. On stage to present the prestigious award at Dreamland in Margate, Edward Enninful paid homage to the revolutionary work of this year’s four nominees – and, as it turned out, four winners.
“I think art, like fashion, can tell a story about celebrating difference, can show how diverse people are – challenging ideas of race, gender and sexuality and tackling important issues in the world that we live in together,” he said before opening the winners’ envelope.
“Speaking of the power of creativity here’s something quite extraordinary. At a time of political division in Britain and conflict in much of the world, the artists wanted to use the occasion of the Turner Prize to make a strong statement of community and solidarity and have formed themselves into a collective.”
For the first time in its 35-year history, Oscar Murillo, Helen Cammock, Tai Shani and Lawrence Abu Hamdan will share the £40,000 prize between them. The artists themselves petitioned the jury to award the prize to them as a collective rather than as individuals.
“When there is already so much that divides and isolates people and communities, we feel strongly motivated to use the occasion of the prize to make a collective statement in the name of commonality, multiplicity and solidarity – in art as in society,” the group wrote. The jury, chaired by the director of Tate Britain Alex Farquharson, unanimously agreed to their request, noting in a statement: “Their symbolic act reflects the political and social poetics that we admire and value in their work.”
Credit: Vogue
