The Sovereign African Art Prize
The 2011 Sovereign African Art Prize will be the inaugural prize for The Sovereign Art Foundation in Africa. The Foundation was established in Hong Kong in 2004 and is well-known for running seven successful art prizes in Asia and four in Europe.
Entry for the African prize is by expert nomination only and a world class panel of judges will select the best 20 entries as finalists. The 20 finalists will be exhibited at the FNB Joburg Art Fair from 22nd - 25th September and will then be sold with proceeds being evenly split between the finalists and charity.
The aims of the African art prize are to (i) raise public awareness of African art; (ii) provide much needed exposure, recognition and opportunity to African artists; and (iii) raise significant funding for charities in Africa.
The Sovereign Art Foundation has been very successful in discovering mid career artists who have quickly gone on to achieve record prices at auction so the opportunity to purchase these works presents a compelling case for investment whilst assisting a worthy charitable cause.
How the prize works
The prize will follow the same format as its Asian and European counterparts. Entry is by nomination only. The Sovereign Art Foundation will assemble a large panel of art experts from all over Africa who will be asked to nominate the best African artists and encourage them to submit images of their work for evaluation. Next a panel of renowned judges will select the best 20 works and these will be exhibited at the FNB Joburg Art Fair.
During the exhibition the judging panel will evaluate the 20 finalists and decide the winner who will receive a cash prize of US$25,000.
There will also be a public vote prize. The public will be invited to choose their favourite piece by either voting at the exhibition or voting online through the website gallery. The artist who receives the most public votes will receive a prize of US$1,000.
The gala dinner will take place after the exhibition at a venue to be decided. The winning artists will be presented with their prizes at the dinner. The winning piece will become the property of the Foundation and will be loaned to patrons, sponsors, museums etc and the remaining 29 finalists, including the public vote prize winner, will be auctioned with the proceeds being split evenly between the artist and The Foundation. All funds raised by during the evening will be applied without deduction to assist disadvantaged children using the arts as rehabilitation or therapy. This is possible as all overheads of The Sovereign Art Foundation are covered by the patronage of The Sovereign Group.