grand prix
2023 year's grand prix winner
Grazyna Jolanta Lindau
"The tree of life is like a memory. It loses its leaves, like people lose the ability to recollect. Visible holes appear just like the memory becomes a sieve. The brain stops remembering. Sometimes there are animals that bring peace, solace and remind of forgotten reality."
Grazyna Jolanta Lindau
The Jury's motivation:
This was nominated by the jury for the Grand Prize. There were four of us all from different countries.
We decided on the following criteria together before we viewed the medals:
1: The maker had a long standing medal making practice.
2: The medal was technically well crafted.
3: The concept was clear and topical inspiring emotional responses.
4. The concept connected and evolved from the obverse to the reverse.
5. The work 'invited' the need to be held.
Initially, before viewing, we agreed to that each choose our three favourites to generate a short list. We took our time (nearly two hours). Once chosen and discussed, we narrowed our list down to three, and finally one. We all agreed for the following reasons:
This medal approached the difficult subject of memory loss with effective imagery and emotional depth.
The use of negative space (holes) in the piece was imaginative and bold and further engaged with the central impetus of touch and texture and even scale.
It invited personal reflection but also hope and solace.
I hope this explains our reasons. Congratulations from us all.
Jury: Maria Rosa Figeiredo (Portugal),Valeria Vettorato (Italy), Christine Massey (New Zealand) and Javier Gimeno (Spain)