Shortlist 2015

MARILYN ARSEM (US)

Marilyn Arsem has been creating live events since 1975, ranging from solo performances to large-scale interactive works incorporating installation and performance. Based in the United States, she presents her work internationally in festivals, galleries, and museums. Many of her works are durational in nature, and minimal in actions and materials. She taught at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston for 27 years, establishing one of the most extensive programs internationally in visual-based performance art. READ MORE

SAARA HANNULA (FI)

Saara Hannula is a Helsinki-based performance maker, researcher, curator and educator. Working with people (and non-humans) from a range of backgrounds, Hannula’s collaborative practice is firmly cross-disciplinary. In recent years Hannula’s projects have become increasingly durational, research-oriented and open-ended, defying marketability, categorization and capitalization. Her current work revolves around questions concerning performance and ecology. READ MORE

Myriam Lefkowitz (FR)

Myriam Lefkowitz is a choreographer and performer based in Paris. She is the director of the Cie Débribes, founded in 2004. Her choreographic works essay ideas of motion and gaze, and more recently focus on our sensorial response to urban environments – the project Walk, Hands, Eyes (A City) is a perceptive experience of walking and seeing the city. Walk, Hands, Eyes (A City) was presented at the 55th Venice Biennale, Lefkowitz work is presented widely across visual and performing arts contexts. READ MORE

BOB AND ROBERTA SMITH (UK)

Bob and Roberta Smith’s visual and live interventions into political and democratic processes take the form of moments of protest and sloganeering – together they constitute the proposal of the artwork as a socially reactive and responsible ‘political’ campaign. Make Art Not War belongs to the Tate collection (London), other projects have been exhibited around the world. Bob and Roberta Smith’s practice playfully engages with national and international socio-political contexts and issues, often deploying hand-painted signs to engender discussion and debate. READ MORE

VOINA COLLECTIVE (RU)

A Russian street-art group known for socially provocative and politically charged works, Voina has more than sixty members ranging from poets, artists, journalists and students. The collective’s diverse range of backgrounds, training and specialisms creates an equally diverse range of socially engaged live events and happenings in public space, ranging from the humorous to moments of considerable risk – they have faced arrest and prosecution many times for their activities. The collective is self-supporting and does not cooperate with the state or collaborate with Russian galleries or the such. READ MORE

WILLOH S.WEILAND (AU)

Willoh S.Weiland is an Australian artist, writer and curator. She is Artistic Director of Aphids and a member of the live-art collective Field Theory. Her recent trilogy of live works Forever Now, Void Love and Yelling at Stars (2008-2015) explores the relationship between art and infinity. Often working collaboratively with non-artists Weiland is interested in creating impossible propositions and fulfilling them. Aphids (with Liz Dunn, Tristan Meecham, Lara Thoms, Martyn Coutts and Thea Baumman) has presented works at most major Australian venues and festivals. Weiland has also made work for the Australian Centre for the Moving Image, the Next Wave Festival, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney and the Centre for Contemporary Art in Glasgow. READ MORE