The Vera Checklist Center for Artwork and Politics has announced Australian Aboriginal artist collective proppaNOW as the receiver of the 2022–24 Jane Lombard Prize for Art and Social Justice. The Meanjin/Brisbane–based collective was decided on for the honor, which is attended by a $25,000 money prize, for its 2021 exhibition “OCCURRENT AFFAIR,” at the College of Queensland Art Museum, showcasing new and modern operates by its associates and addressing “current sociopolitical, financial and environmental troubles when celebrating the power, resilience and continuity of Aboriginal tradition,” according to a curatorial statement.
Voting unanimously in their favor was an award jury chaired by Simone Leigh, who received the Golden Lion at this year’s Venice Biennale, and moreover comprising Carin Kuoni, Cuauhtémoc Medina, Wanda Nanibush, and Rasha Salti. In a joint assertion, the jury associates praised proppaNOW for its efforts in pushing again in opposition to “the invisibility of city Aboriginal modern artwork,” noting that it has “broken with expectations of what is good (‘proppa’) in Aboriginal art created a new sovereign area for 1st Nations artists internationally outdoors colonial stereotypes, needs for authenticity, and capitalist capitulations and opened new political imaginaries.”
The Jane Lombard Prize, which honors outstanding achievements in artwork and politics and recognizes artworks that advance social justice, took as its theme this yr “Correction.” proppaNOW, which was recognized in 2003 to convey awareness to city Aboriginal artists and to combat the regular anticipations positioned on these types of artists by colonizers, was a person of five finalists for the prize, alongside Colectivo Cherani for Cherán Cultural Middle Khalil Rabah for The Palestinian Museum of Organic Background and Humankind KUNCI Research Forum & Collective for School of Inappropriate Training and The Africa Cluster of the Yet another Roadmap School. The collective’s project will be exhibited at New York’s Vera Listing Centre next drop.