Bryony Bond started 2016 with a move across the Pennines from The Whitworth in Manchester to The Tetley, Leeds. She looks back on a year of “new starts”.
For Cardiff-based, Iraqi-born artist Rabab Ghazoul it’s been a busy year of campaigning against local arts funding cuts and exhibiting internationally. She looks back on a “heartening” and “confusing” year.
2016 started well for The New Art Gallery Walsall, but as it draws to a close the venue is fighting for survival in the face of proposed local council funding cuts. The Black Country gallery’s director reflects on “a funny old year”.
In November, the London-based artist Heather Phillipson won the £10,000 Jarman Award, which recognises cutting edge, experimental artists’ film. She reflects on the highs and lows of a “mountain range kind of year”.
This year saw Sam Thorne take up his new role at Nottingham Contemporary gallery, having previously been artistic director of Tate St Ives. He looks back on a challenging and “often disappointing” 2016.
The Glasgow-based artist, who first came to prominence in the 1990s, this year became the recipient of the newly created Freelands Award for women artists. She shares her thoughts on 12 months that also saw her first substantial show in Scotland for 10 years.
Salford-based artist Maurice Carlin is the recipient of the inaugural Clore Visual Artist Fellowship 2016/17, supported by a-n. He recalls a year in which personal successes have been overshadowed by global events.
In February 2016, London-based artist Emma Hart won the biennial Max Mara Art Prize for Women, the prize for which includes a six-month residency in Italy and a solo show at Whitechapel Gallery in 2017. She looks back on a year in which she “almost cheered up”.
This year saw Frances Morris become director of Tate Modern and in June the gallery’s £260m extension, The Switch House, opened to positive reviews. She reflects on what has personally been an “amazing year” while lamenting a period in which “respect for difference and individuality” has been vigorously attacked.
a-n’s Executive Director Jeanie Scott reflects on an incredibly busy year for the organisation that has seen the publication of the Paying Artists Exhibition Payment Guidance, wide-ranging support for artists through a-n bursaries, and membership reach a record high. And, despite an increasingly messy global situation, says there’s much to look forward to in 2017.
Five a-n News writers – based in London, Birmingham and Glasgow – pick, in no particular order, their top five exhibitions of the year.
Sarah Bodman, senior research fellow at UWE Bristol’s Centre for Fine Print Research and writer of a-n’s Artists’ Books series, picks her ten favourite publications of the year.
