Red Mansion Art Prize and Exhibition 'Offers Adventure and New Encounters’

The Red Mansion Foundation’s Art Prize invites nominations for postgraduate students from each of Chelsea College of Art, the Royal College of Art, Central Saint Martins, the Royal Academy Schools, Slade School, Goldsmiths College and the Ruskin School of Drawing & Fine Art. Students are judged through a process of independent adjudication and studio visits by an international jury, who select one winner from each college. This year’s judges were Kirsty Ogg, Director at Bloomberg New Contemporaries; Michael Newman, art critic and historian; Matt Williams, artist; Carey Young, artist; and Nicolette Kwok, Director of The Red Mansion Foundation.

The Foundation is a not-for-profit organisation, which encourages mutual cultural understanding through contemporary art, creating a dialogue between East and West through the Red Mansion Art Prize as well as exchange programmes, publications and exhibitions at its impressive space in central London. As the RCA’s Head of Fine Art Juan Cruz says: ‘With the extraordinary explosion in the Chinese art market over the last ten years and the increasing vibrancy of the contemporary art scene there, it is impossible to comprehend contemporary art without the Chinese perspective.’

With the College’s increasingly international student body, initiatives such as this are invaluable, to provide opportunities for meaningful communication across cultures. The RCA’s involvement with the Red Mansion Prize goes hand-in-hand with its ongoing endeavours to maintain links across the world, attract international students and faculty members, and celebrate cultural diversity and understanding. The same impetus drives the partnership with the International Awards for Art Criticism (IAAC), an annual prize launched in 2013, organised by the Shanghai 21st Century Minsheng Art Museum (M21) in association with the UK Section of the International Association of Art Critics (AICA).

The RCA’s winning student Dominic Hawgood graduated from the MA Photography programme in 2014. All the winners were invited to travel to China during the summer for a period of one month, where they lived and worked alongside local artists and were given a studio space – with flights, accommodation and living expenses provided. Every year, the students are judged, in part, on how they propose to use their time in residence in China. Hawgood’s proposal referenced Lu Yang’s animation Wrathful King Kong Core (2011), shown at the RCA, and Xu Zhen’s In Just a Blink of an Eye (2005) that was performed at the Hayward Gallery in 2013, and he proposed using the time in Beijing to ‘create installations in response to the environment, immersing myself in the light and architecture of Beijing and considering more fully the role of light and sculpture within my work’.

Reflecting on the experience, Hawgood says: ‘I’m still trying to process my experience in China. It was dreamlike and a strange space, bridging a gap between postgraduate study and a new unknown. I considered new digital possibilities, strategies for image making and trialled scanning techniques and spent time wandering and exploring. Ambient light at times was mysterious and beautiful; it had first attracted me to the country, and was also the source of greatest inspiration. I met many different people on my travels, but I was just as content alone, it felt like an important time to think.’

Each of the colleges takes its turn to host the exhibition of finalists’ work. Last year was the turn of the RCA, and this year the Slade will present the exhibition, featuring work by Dominic Hawgood and the other five 2015 prize winners: Emily Motto (The Ruskin School of Art), Tristan Barlow (Slade School of Fine Art), Julie Born Schwartz (Royal Academy Schools), Adam Tylicki (Central Saint Martins), and Cadi Froehlich (Chelsea College of Arts). With representatives of some of the UK’s top art colleges, this is a rare opportunity to take a view across a range of postgraduate institutions, and see the results of the Red Mansion Foundation’s support for the next generation of young artists.

The Red Mansion Art Prize Exhibition takes place at the Slade Research Centre, UCL, Woburn Square, London WC1H 0AB, from Friday 20 March to Friday 27 March, 10am – 6pm. The exhibition is open to the public and admission is free.