The 2017 Absolut Art Award Winners

Anne Imhof has won the award for Art Work and Huey Copeland has won the award in the Art Writing category.
Both winners will receive cash prizes along with a budget to produce a new work of art and art publication, respectively.

Jury citation: Anne Imhof

“The Jury awards the Absolut Art Award for Art Work to Anne Imhof for her proposal to produce a new work set in salt desert in Death Valley, California. Although drawing on previous performances, the work will represent the beginning of something new in Imhof’s career in that it exchanges the white cube for the Badwater Basin, pushing the production outside the parameters offered by the art institution. The performance and the musical score will culminate in a film.”

Jury citation: Huey Copeland

“The Jury awards the Absolut Art Award for Art Writing to Huey Copeland for the book proposal Touched by the Mother, a collection of essays that provide a multi-faceted perspective on the methods of American art and discourse of the last fifty years. Building upon and extending on the works of thinkers such as Ralph Ellison, Frantz Fanon, and Fred Moten, the book promises to be both a personal account of what it means to navigate the world of contemporary American culture as a gay black man, and a critical consideration of the works of many of today’s most important artists.”

“Congratulations to Anne Imhof and Huey Copeland – this year’s winners of the 2017 Absolut Art Award. Selected from an amazing group of finalists, Daniel and the Jury have chosen two incredible winners whose projects we are excited to help realise in the coming months. We are thrilled to be collaborating with them and look forward to celebrating with them at the Absolut Art Award ceremony this September in Stockholm,” said Saskia Neuman, Global Art Manager, Absolut.