Tauba Auerbach, Extended Object, 2021
Astrup Fearnley Collection
Courtesy of the artist and STANDARD (OSLO)
© Tauba Auerbach / BONO 2023
Queen Sonja Print Award Jury Statement 2018:
"The jury has been deeply impressed by Tauba Auerbach’s substantial body of work and the way that printmaking and graphic art are fully integrated into her artistic practice. In paintings, prints, and artists’ books that are at once conceptually rigorous and visually lush, she focuses on abstract patterns – both random and ordered – to explore the structures of logic and perception. From aquatints that play with the dot patterns used in commercial printing; to screenprints whose abstract patterns she made by combining various typographic elements; to an elaborate pop-up book full of colourful three-dimensional geometries; to an artist’s book whose pages are printed with every possible colour in the RBG colour scale, her work is consistently engaged with the aesthetic, conceptual, and technical parameters of printing. Issues of reproduction, sequencing, and seriality, so fundamental to printmaking, are also at the heart of her vision.
In 2013 she established her own publishing imprint, Diagonal Press, which demonstrates her exceptional commitment to printmaking. The possibilities of publishing as a format in its own right allows Auerbach to maintain artistic autonomy and independent distribution while at the same time allowing her work to reach a broader audience, which is very much within the democratic tradition of printmaking."
Tauba Auerbach (b. 1981, San Francisco, California) lives and works in New York City, USA, and they earned a BA in visual art from Stanford University, Palo Alto, California, in 2003. In 2021, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art presented S v Z — a 17 year survey of Auerbach’s work. Exhibitions of their work have been presented at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Cleveland; the Institute of Contemporary Art, London; and Bergen Kunsthall in Norway, which traveled to venues in Sweden and Belgium.
Yto Barrada, Mnemonic Phrases, 2019
Courtesy of the artist
© Yto Barrada
Queen Sonja Print Award Jury Statement 2022:
"The jury is deeply impressed by Yto Barrada’s multidisciplinary practice where printmaking, printed matter or methods of reproduction are used with effortless ease to serve conceptual purposes. Informed by postcolonial thought and socio-political concerns, the artist engages in topics of identity, urban development, nature or collective memory. Her eclectic use of traditional printmaking techniques such as woodblock, serigraphy or letterpress printing, as well as risograph prints and different photo printing techniques, allows her the flexibility to simultaneously work with text, image and more abstract motifs.
Barrada investigates archival practices, poster traditions, institutionalized narratives and propaganda production, to create real and imaginary stories. There is a poignant playfulness and curiosity in her multifaceted artistic production. The jury is fascinated by Barrada’s continuous search for new forms of expressions, pushing the boundaries of her own practice and our understanding of printmaking and graphic art."
Yto Barrada (Moroccan, French, b. 1971, Paris) studied history and political science at the Sorbonne and photography in New York. Her work has been exhibited at Tate Modern (London), MoMA (New York), The Renaissance Society (Chicago), Witte de With (Rotterdam), Haus der Kunst (Munich), Centre Pompidou (Paris), Whitechapel Gallery (London), and the 2007 and 2011 Venice Biennale.