The John Simon Guggenheim Foundation recently announced their 2012 Fellows, and (remarkably) nearly half of the winners in the Fine Arts category are painters. The Foundation‘s goal is to help provide funding for artists to “work with as
much creative freedom as possible.” In other words, the Fellows may spend their loot, which varies according to need but is quite substantial, any way they want. Hearty congratulations to all the recipients and condolences to the thousands who were not selected. Here are some images from the talented painters on the 2012 roster.
A little information about the selection process (via Guggenheim website):
The Foundation receives between 3,500 and 4,000 applications each
year. Although no one who applies is guaranteed success in the
competition, there is no prescreening: all applications are reviewed.
Approximately 220 Fellowships are awarded each year.During the rigorous selection process, applicants will first be
pooled with others working in the same field, and examined by experts in
that field: the work of artists will be reviewed by artists, that of
scientists by scientists, that of historians by historians, and so on.
The Foundation has a network of several hundred advisers, who either
meet at the Foundation offices to look at applicants’ work, or receive
application materials to read offsite. These advisers, all of whom are
themselves former Guggenheim Fellows, then submit reports critiquing and
ranking the applications in their respective fields. Their
recommendations are then forwarded to and weighed by a Committee of
Selection, which then determines the number of awards to be made in each
area. Occasionally, no application in a given area is considered
strong enough to merit a Fellowship.
Related posts:
IMAGES: Louise Belcourt’s Place in the World
Dawn Clements at the Whitney Biennial
Matt Connors knows
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