Art: Turner Prize 2023 shortlist announced; Towner Eastbourne to host exhibition September 28 to April 14 2024

by Lucia Carpio, Head of Content

Towner Eastbourne, the East Sussex art gallery, will host the Turner Prize 2023, the world’s leading prize for contemporary art, from September 28 2023 to April 14 2024.

Tate Britain has announced the four shortlisted nominees as Jesse Darling, Ghislaine Leung, Rory Pilgrim and Barbara Walker.  The winner will be announced on December 5 2023 at an award ceremony in Eastbourne's Winter Gardens.

Installation view of Jesse Darling, Enclosures at Camden Art Centre, 2022.
Photo by Eva Herzog. Courtesy of the artist and Camden Art Centre, London.

Jesse Darling was nominated for his solo No Medals, No Ribbons at Modern Art Oxford and Enclosures at Camden Art Centre.  Darling's work encompasses sculptures and installations which evoke the vulnerability of the human body and the precariousness of power structures.  The jury was struck by Darling's ability to manipulate materials in ways that skillfully express the messy reality of life.  They felt that these exhibitions revealed the breadth and integrity of Darling's practice, exposing the world's underlying fragility and refusing to make oneself appear legible and functioning to others.

Ghislaine Leung, Fountains. Installation View at Simian, Copenhagen, Denmark, 2023. Courtesy the artist and Simian, Copenhagen; and Maxwell Graham, New York; and Cabinet, London.
Photo credit GRAYSC.

Ghislane Leung was nominated for her solo exhibition Fountains at Simian, Copenhagen.  Leung's work takes the form of "scores" - sets of instructions which test the boundaries of the gallery space.  Baby monitors, child safety gates, inflatable structures, toys, and water fountains are used to turn the exhibition structure on its head, asking questions about time, leisure and labour.  The jury particularly commended the warm, humorous and transcendental qualities that lay behind the sleek aesthetic and conceptual nature of Leung's work, as well as her commitment to challenging the way art is produced and circulated.

Rory Pilgrim's RAFTS, 2022, HD Video Still (1:06:55). Courtesy of andriesse~eyck galerie.

Rory Pilgrim was nominated for the commission RAFTS at Serpentine and Barking Town Hall, and a live performance of the work at Cadogan Hall, London.  Pilgrim's work interweaves stories, poems, music and film, created in collaboration with local communities in the London borough of Barking and Dagenham, to reflect on times of change and struggle during the pandemic.  The jury praised the project as a standout example of social practice.  They felt that Pilgrim's beautiful and affecting musical arrangements gave light to their collaborators' voices and that the confidence and vulnerability of the performance reflected the strength of the relationship between artist and community.

Barbara Walker's Burden of Proof, 2022. Installation view: Sharjah Biennial 15, Old Diwan Al Amiri, 2023. Commissioned by Sharjah Art Foundation with the support of The Whitworth, The University of Manchester.
Photo by Danko Stjepanovic.

Barbara Walker was nominated for her presentation entitled Burden of Proof at Sharjah Biennial 15.  With a practice that interrogates past and present issues of racial identity, exclusion and power, Walker's presentation explores the impact of the Windrush scandal, underlaying figurative drawn portraits with facsimiles of the documentation these individuals had to produce to prove their right to remain.  The jury applauded Walker's ability to use portraits of monumental scale to tell stories of a similarly monumental nature, whilst maintaining a profound tenderness and intimacy across the full scope of her work.

Turner Prize, one of the best-known prizes for the visual arts in the world, aims to promote public debate around new developments in contemporary British art.  Established in 1984, the Prize is awarded to a British artist for an outstanding exhibition or other presentation of their work in the previous twelve months.

The Turner Prize winner will be awarded £25,000 with £10,000 awarded to the other shortlisted artists.

Turner Prize 2023 is one of the major events of Towner 100, a year-long centenary celebration of arts and culture across Eastbourne.  The other major exhibition  at Towner Eastbourne this year is Barbara Hepworth: Art & Life which is currently held until September 25 2023.

Members of the Turner Prize 2023 jury are Martin Clark, Director, Camden Art Centre; Cédric Fauq, Chief Curator, Capc musée d’art contemporain de Bordeaux; Melanie Keen, Director of Wellcome Collection; and Helen Nisbet, Artistic Director, Art Night.  The jury is chaired by Alex Farquharson, Director, Tate Britain.

With support from Eastbourne Borough Council and East Sussex County Council, the Turner Prize 2023 will bring transformative cultural and social experiences for visitors and residents, said Joe Hill, Director and CEO of Towner Eastbourne.

In a press release, Hill said the Towner Eastbourne looks forward to welcoming the shortlisted artists who will collectively bring a sense of place and community to the galleries, through their diverse range of practices, from film and performance to drawing and sculpture.  

"Together they are an incredibly strong set of exhibiting artists, who ask us to look at some of the most pertinent issues of today.  

"There is really something for everyone to engage with in this shortlist and my thanks to the jury for their research, knowledge and insight in putting forward these four brilliant artists for the exhibition."