TORONTO, March 28, 2017 /CNW/ - Toronto-based multidisciplinary artist Lee Henderson has today been announced as the winner of the 2017 Canadian Glenfiddich® Artists in Residence Prize. This summer he will travel to the Glenfiddich® Distillery in Dufftown, Scotland, where he will produce a work that will examine the multiple meanings of the word 'spirit' and "consider whisky as a vehicle for commemoration and an expedient to shared rituals of mourning".
Henderson works in a variety of media, including video, photography, installation, sculpture, and performance, producing elegant investigations into mortality. "But they're typically funny," he says, "…the way that King Lear is funny". During his three-month residency, he will explore past local legends and ghost stories, and then set about re-haunting the spaces electronically.
Henderson is one of only seven artists from around the world awarded the prize, which is one of the most coveted residency prizes in the arts. The selected artists will live and work at the Glenfiddich® distillery in Northern Scotland, near the historic Balvenie Castle.
Celebrating its sixteenth year, the Glenfiddich® Artists in Residence Prize includes travel and living expenses, as well as providing artists with a significant production budget to create and present a new work on-site. Valued at $20,000 per artist, the Residency Prize represents the Glenfiddich® commitment to the arts and the communities it serves.
Andy Fairgrieve, curator of the Glenfiddich® Artists in Residence Prize, shared the news from Dufftown, earlier today. "We are very proud that the Artists in Residence Prize appeals to so many of Canada's leading and emerging artists," he says, noting the high number of applicants this year. Following an Open Call process, a jury of seven Canadian artists and art professionals creates a short list of ten artists, from which Fairgrieve makes the final selection.
In relation to Lee Henderson's residency proposal Fairgrieve says, "Lee's ideas surrounding spirits is of course very apt at Glenfiddich, referencing not only our single malt whisky but the haunting beautiful and historic landscape surrounding the distillery itself. His proposal to create apparitional interventions around Glenfiddich is one I look forward seeing being brought into reality and I am sure will be enjoyed by the Glenfiddich workers and local residents of Dufftown.
Upon learning of his win, Henderson stated, "I'm totally thrilled and honoured, and can't wait to start the project." He will travel to Dufftown in early June. Fairgrieve will be in Toronto this week to meet Henderson in advance of the summer residency.
The Glenfiddich® Artists in Residence Prize has sponsored more than 100 artists since its inception since 2002. Canadian artists include Eleanor King (2016), Jon Sasaki (2015), Rhonda Weppler & Trevor Mahovsky (2014), Daniel Barrow (2013), Jillian Mcdonald (2012), Helen Cho (2011), Damian Moppett (2010), Arabella Campbell (2009), Dave Dyment (2008), Jonathon Kaiser (2007), Annie Pootoogook (2006) and Myfanwy Macleod (2005).
This year's distinguished jury panel included Dr. Sara Diamond, President of OCAD University; Crystal Mowry, Senior Curator at the Kitchener-Waterloo Art Gallery; Michelle Jacques, Chief Curator at the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria; Kristy Trinier, Director of Visual, Digital and Media Arts at the Banff Centre; Ivan Jurakic, Director of the University of Waterloo Art Gallery; Stefan Hancherow, independent curator and Director of the 2015 Feature Art Fair, and the Canadian 2008 Glenfiddich® Artists in Residence Prize recipient, Dave Dyment.
Note to Editors
Both Andy Fairgrieve, curator of the Glenfiddich® Artists in Residence Prize and Lee Henderson, winner of the 2017 Canadian Glenfiddich® Artists in Residence Prize will be available for interviews on Thursday, March 30th in person in Toronto, or remotely.
About Lee Henderson
Born in Saskatchewan in 1979, Henderson studied art in Alberta and Germany before returning to receive his MFA in 2005 from the University of Regina. His work moves in constant contemplation of death, in senses grand and minute, somewhere between the persistence of collective histories and the brevity of individual lives.
Recent projects and commissions include Fixing a Novel by Removing all the Adjectives, a single, mirror-polished brick in a cellar somewhere under Friedrichshain (Kunstraum Tapir, Berlin, 2014); The Known Effects of Lightning on the Body, (YYZ, Toronto, 2014; The Rooms, St. John's, 2015; Nuit Blanche Edmonton, 2015); and Palliative Care (1985-1992), a video installation featuring a supercut of every reference to death found in TV's "The Golden Girls" (Latitude53, Edmonton, 2016).
Henderson was the recipient of the CONTACT 2016 Fondation Emmanuelle Gattuso Prize for Never Letting Us Take Breath, an automated slide-lecture and installation of photographic prints offering a meditation on the photo-archive and human mortality.
Notable recent exhibition venues include The Phillips Collection at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, the Magenta Festival Boston, The Zero Film Festival (USA); The Dunlop Art Gallery, Mendel Art Gallery, The Rooms Provincial Art Gallery, and Zalucky Contemporary (Canada); Samaband Islenskra Myndlistarmanna, Reykjavik (Iceland). His work can be found in private and public collections including the Mendel Art Gallery/Remai Modern, the University of Regina President's Collection, and The Center for Fine Art Photography USA.
He is represented by Zalucky Contemporary, in Toronto.
About William Grant & Sons Ltd.
William Grant & Sons is an independent family-owned distiller founded by William Grant in 1887 and today still controlled by the fifth generation of his family. Named 'IWSC Distiller of the Year' in 2012 for the fifth consecutive year, William Grant & Sons distils some of the world's leading brands of Scotch whisky, including the world's favourite single malt Glenfiddich®, the handcrafted range of The Balvenie® single malts and one of the world's best loved blended Scotches, Grant's®, as well as selected other spirits, including Hendrick's® Gin, and Sailor Jerry® Spiced Rum and Tullamore Dew®. The Glenfiddich® Artists in Residence Prize is very close to the Grant family's heart with the art created taking inspiration from the distillery and its surrounding area which has been home to the Grant family for five generations.
SOURCE William Grant & Sons Ltd.
or to organize an interview with Andy Fairgrieve or Lee Henderson, contact: Amanda Gun-Munro, Public Relations, C: 647-969-6413, E: [email protected]
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