The Opening Night of the 2023 Ravenswood Australian Women’s Art Prize was a night of excitement enjoyed by more than 300 guests including artists, family and friends of finalists, sponsors, special guests and members of the Ravenswood community.
This year, a record-breaking 2042 entries were received representing every state and territory in Australia. 30% of artists who entered resided in regional centres, outback and remote Indigenous communities. The judges selected 119 finalists, comprising 60 professional artists, 51 emerging artists and 8 Indigenous emerging artists. The 2023 Ravenswood Australian Women’s Art Prize received almost two and a half times more entries than the 2023 Archibald Prize.
Maria-Fernanda Cardoso’s masterly artwork, Actual Size V (Maratus Madelineae) is the Professional Artist winner of the 2023 Ravenswood Australian Women’s Art Prize, winning $35,000 in Australia’s highest value professional artist prize for women.
Jennifer Turpin, practising artist, one of the judges and Ravenswood Australian Women’s Art Prize Patron says, ‘Maria Fernanda Cardoso is an artist whose three decades of practice is focused on keen observation of nature, often the minutiae. Combining art and science, her work is always playful and revealing of nature’s wonders. Actual Size V (Maratus Madelineae), a spectacular image of a tiny spider magnified to a gigantic scale, reveals the extraordinary patterns, colours and textures of nature that we don’t often get to see.’
Cardoso is based in Sydney and is represented by Sydney and Singapore-based gallery Sullivan + Strumpf.
The Federal Member for Bradfield and Shadow Minister for The Arts Hon Paul Fletcher MP, officially opened the 2023 Ravenswood Australian Women’s Art Prize on Friday 12 May.
Many of the record-breaking 2042 entries received in this year’s Art Prize reflected on the natural environment, specifically on the fragilities and beauty of nature. The 2023 Ravenswood Australian Women’s Art Prize received almost two and a half times more entries than the Archibald Prize.
The Emerging Artist Prize, supported by the Reed Family Foundation, was won by Alethea Richter for her silkscreen artwork Untitled (Dissolution1), which the judges described as ‘a myriad of coloured dots that make up an image that is as mesmerizing and transfixing as a video screen.’ They further commented on the artwork, acknowledging the great sophistication shown by the artist despite her youth saying, ‘It really draws you from a distance and rewards you on a closer view, with the reveal of the details, the intricacy, and the subtlety.’ Richter is based in Brisbane, Queensland.
Wiradjuri artist Freyja Fristad has won the Indigenous Emerging Artist Prize, supported by the Tritton Family, for her artwork Interference of Perception: Rhopography (Lamp). ‘It is quite brilliant the way the light is revealed very cleverly in a series of horizontal lines,’ said the judges. ‘This is an artwork that is not a traditional indigenous artwork but has some remembrances of traditional practice. It is a very beautiful contemporary work.’ Fristad is based in Sydney.
‘I am immensely proud to oversee our seventh annual prize and exhibition for women artists,’ said Ravenswood School for Girls Principal Mrs Anne Johnstone. ‘At Ravenswood, we are passionate about empowering women and this generous art prize is a way for us to advance Australia’s talented women artists, providing them with a platform to showcase their creative expression and extraordinary talents, increase opportunity for recognition, and celebrate women artists across the country.’
The Ravenswood Australian Women’s Art Prize is Australia’s highest-value art prize for women artists with a $35,000 Professional Artist Prize, as well as an Emerging Artist Prize of $5,000 and an Indigenous Emerging Artist Prize of $5,000. There is also a People’s Choice Award supported by Edwina Palmer of $2,000 plus a Derivan art pack valued at $500.
Established by Ravenswood School for Girls in 2017 to recognise, encourage and promote women in the visual arts, the Ravenswood Australian Women’s Art Prize is proudly supported by partners Marshall. Chan. Yahl. Real Estate, Trippas White Group (TWG), Active Networks, R.M. Williams OUTBACK magazine, The Art Scene, Buildcorp, Clarke Murphy Print, Architectus, EPM Projects, Olan Living, Optus and Derivan.