Grand Rapids-based
ArtPrize announced this week that the 200th artist has secured a venue for the event. With $449,000 in cash prizes, including $250,000 for the top winner, ArtPrize is the world's largest art prize.
"About 60 percent of those 200 artists are not local artists, so there's definitely a need to house them," says Bill Holsinger-Robinson of Pomegranate Studios, the organization providing technical support to ArtPrize. "Kathy Wildt is coordinating with local families to host an artist. We're not doing the matching; artists and prospective hosts can fill out a
form on the ArtPrize web site and the artist will find the venue that's best for them."
Artists can choose from 100 venues secured thus far. A handful of venues will host just one artist. Others, like
The B.O.B. and the former Federal Building will host from 20 to 75.
"We've also put out a call for volunteers," Holsinger-Robinson says. "We'll need upwards of 1,000 people helping with registration locations and people to provide wayfinding throughout the city. Instead of having signage all over the city, what better way to highlight the great attitude of this city than to have people do that?"
The event runs from September 23 to October 10, with expectations of 10,000 to 15,000 visitors. The winner is decided by public vote placed via mobile phone or the Internet; each visitor will have one vote.
Important dates:
• July 31 – final date for artists and venues to register.
• August 15 -- all artists with venues will be entered into the competition.
• October 1 – top ten winners announced.
• October 1 through 8 – balloted voting to determine individual ranking of the top ten.
• October 8 – winner announced.
• October 10 – final day for public viewing of art.
Source: Bill Holsinger-Robinson, Pomegranate Studios; Michael Zalewski,
Seyferth & Associates
Deborah Johnson Wood is development news editor for Rapid Growth Media. She can be contacted at [email protected].
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