IHC Telecom Art Awards announces winners
25 September 2009 Hamilton artist Cherie Mellsopp has won the 2009 IHC Telecom Art Awards with a vivid green artwork made up of approximately 1500 green dots, layered across a broad canvas and superimposed with a design of squares drawn in fine black and silver pen.
“The winning work I found quite beautiful,” says Paula Savage, one of the judges and City Gallery Wellington director. “It appealed to me because it had the regulated, obsessional requirement of patterning. I really like that.”
Artist and fellow judge Dick Frizzell says the winning work stops you in your tracks. “The intensity and the originality of the colour field of green stickers with its overlay of delicate line work was hard to ignore.”
The winners were announced at a function and auction at Chaffers Gallery in Wellington on 23 September. Cherie, 31, has worked at the Sandz Gallery and Studio in Hamilton for the past five years. She picked up first prize and $5000 for Green Spots with Pen. Sandz is a gallery and shared work space for artists with intellectual disabilities. She sold her work at a live auction for $1500.
Cherie has entered the awards for a few years and has been a finalist before. “I got this idea from out of my head," she says. “Once I saw the materials, it also gave me some good ideas too.”
"Beautifully and lovingly rendered”
Second place went to Jonathan Bowler from Picton. His painting, A Busy Day, was described by judges as having an “orderly and formal quality” and was “beautifully and lovingly rendered”. Jonathan won $2000.
Two third-equal prizes of $1000 were awarded to Jason Beswick from Christchurch and Matthew Bishopp from Tauranga. The judges described Jason’s work, Face Collage, as “witty and graphic”. It is a very lively and economic use of collage and line.”
Matthew’s painting, St Paul’s, was described as “a dense and skilfully painted cityscape detail. Closely observed and deftly depicted in a difficult medium”.
Joanna Lynskey, from Auckland, was awarded the Telecom People’s Choice Award for her 1.5 metre tall papier-mâché cat called Ginger. Chosen by Telecom staff across the country, Joanna’s work Ginger the Garden Cat was the first recipient of the $1000 prize.
“Each piece of art is unique and truly wonderful, just like the extraordinary individuals who created them. I’m very proud to see our staff really taking the Awards to heart, volunteering both on the night and during the exhibition,” says Telecom Chairman Wayne Boyd.