2018 Edition of Young Artist Prize Announced

Cosmoscow, Russia’s only international contemporary art fair, will grant an award for young artists at the event opening in September, 2018. The Credit Suisse Cosmoscow Prize for Young Artists aims to provide new international opportunities for Russian emerging talent as the winner can travel to Switzerland to explore the country’s art scene, in addition to receiving mentorship support and a financial grant.

The expert panel for the Credit Suisse Cosmoscow Prize for Young Artists 2018 includes such renowned art professionals as Sergey Bratkov, artist and professor at Rodchenko Art School, Olga Danilkina, art writer and editor-in-chief of the online magazine about contemporary art Aroundart.ru, Ilya Shipolovskih, Director of the Yeltsin Center art gallery, and Snejana Krsteva, curator at the Garage Museum of Contemporary Art. Among the jury are André Rogger, head of Credit Suisse Collection, David Elliott, curator and writer, Olga Shishko, head of the Department of Film and Media Art at the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts, Dmitry Ozerkov, Director of the Contemporary art department at the State Hermitage Museum, and Kati Kivinen, curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art KIASMA Helsinki.

The Credit Suisse Cosmoscow Prize for Young Artists award includes a financial grant of CHF 3,000, mentorship from Credit Suisse and Cosmoscow, and an art trip to Switzerland. The winner can also participate in an art residency at the PROGR Art Center in Bern, Switzerland.

Last year’s award winner Artem Filatov from Nizhny Novgorod completed his art residency in Bern in June 2018. During his trip to Switzerland he visited several art centers in Zurich, La Chaux-de-Fonds, Locarno and other cities, met with the representatives of the Swiss art community, gave lectures on street art culture in his native Nizhny Novgorod, and started several new projects.

The selection of the winner of the Credit Suisse Cosmoscow Prize for Young Artists is subject to a two-step judging process. At the first stage, members of the expert panel will define the long list of nominees. At the second stage, the Prize Jury, comprised of five art professionals from the worldwide, will choose the winner. Artists with Russian citizenship under the age of 35 working across both visual and multimedia art are eligible for the Prize. The winner of the award will be announced during Cosmoscow’s opening at Gostiny Dvor, Moscow.

Getting recognition through art awards can help emerging artists realise their potential and give them ambition to go further in their careers. For example, photographer and curator Anastasia Bogomolova from Chelyabinsk (now based in Ekaterinburg), the Credit Suisse Cosmoscow Prize winner in 2016, was recently awarded a studio residency of 2019 by Swiss Arts Council Pro Helvetia. The grant will help Anastasia learn more about Switzerland’s cultural context and find new directions in her personal art practice.

Margarita Pushkina, Founding Director of Cosmoscow International Contemporary Art Fair and Founder of Cosmoscow Foundation for Contemporary Art, said: “I am very pleased with the fact that this year we will award the Credit Suisse Cosmoscow Prize for Young Artists for the third time in a row. We’ve received very positive feedback from last year’s winner Artem Filatov, which proves that the Prize opens international horizons for Russian emerging artists. It is also gratifying to see how the expertise of the Prize grows with each passing year. Members of the Expert Panel and the Jury of the Prize consist of established and internationally acclaimed professionals. This fact also contributes to our mission of promoting young Russian artists within global context.”