Mario Testino ‘honoured’
to present Turner Prize 2011
Celebrity fashion photographer
Mario Testino will present The Turner
Prize in Gateshead next month.
Mario Testino will present the Turner Prize 2011;
ABOVE: the photographer with supermodel Kate Moss Photo: REUTERS
By Florence Waters 11:31AM GMT 14 Nov 2011
Turner Prize 2001
‘I think people can make of it what they like. I don’t think it is for me to explain it. I mean I like it you know. For me it’s full of life, but I don’t know what other people might make of it and I don’t think it’s for me to tell people what to think.’
– Martin Creed quoted in BBC News, December 2001
‘Take a bare white room with a light switching on and off and what have you got? A Turner Prize winner.’
– Tom Parry, The Mirror, December 2001
‘He wanted to get the biggest effect with the least effort. It’s the dis-proportion between the effort and the effect.’
– Germaine Greer, Newsnight Review, December 2001
Martin Creed’s installation for the 2001 Turner Prize
© Photo: Tate Photography
Shortlist:
Jury:
- Patricia Bickers, Editor, Art Monthly
- Stuart Evans, representative of the Patrons of New Art
- Robert Storr, Senior Curator, Painting and Sculpture, The Museum of Modern Art, New York
- Jonathan Watkins, Director, Ikon Gallery, Birmingham
- Nicholas Serota, Director, Tate
In a way this was the year the media had been waiting for, Creed’s conceptualism raises the question: ‘what is art?’
Media coverage became increasingly disgruntled as the Prize seemed to have become a victim of its own success. This year’s shortlist was seen as ‘obscure’ while a number of critics felt that the Prize had reached a plateau. There was a demand for less elitism in the selection process, less ‘conceptual art’ and an attack was launched on the ‘art-world’ language used to contextualise the exhibition. Awarding the prize to Martin Creed for Work No.227: The lights going on and off only fuelled this sense of agitation. The choice of Madonna as presenter of the award was criticised as a cynical marketing strategy.
antonyclarkson 