Five $75,000 prizes given annually for the Herb Alpert Award in the Arts in Dance, Film/Video, Music, Theatre and Visual Arts 2017 Herb Alpert Award in the Arts Recipients
- Photos of the 2018 winners here, courtesy of the Herb Alpert Award in the Arts
- Short bios of all winners can be found here.
Santa Monica – The Herb Alpert Foundation and California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) will award the 24th Annual Herb Alpert Award in the Arts to five exceptional mid–career artists at a lunch hosted by the Herb Alpert Foundation in Santa Monica on May 18th, 2018.
The awards recognize artists working in Dance, Film/Video, Music, Theatre and Visual Arts who are risk-takers using their talent, vision, and labor to make something that matters within and potentially beyond their field. The outstanding candidate in each genre receives an unrestricted prize of $75,000.
"We are delighted to celebrate the 2018 Herb Alpert Award in the Arts," says Rona Sebastian, President of the Herb Alpert Foundation. "The five winners are visionary artists who expand their fields as well as our horizons. We believe that championing the arts, individual artists, and arts education– from early childhood through professional development–has profound social, cultural, and personal impact. This is at the core of the Foundation's interests."
CalArts President Ravi Rajan adds, "Artists need two essential things–space and time–to create models of how the world should be through their work. The visionary impulse of Lani Hall and Herb Alpert to help artists create the time and space needed to generate new work is at once generous and astute to their needs. CalArts is honored to administer this transformative award, helping shape the careers of 120 artists over the past 24 years."
"At this fraught moment it's a powerful antidote to honor and support this year's winners who are alert to the world, rigorous in their reach, and fiercely engaged with that which is undepicted, unheard, misnamed, unspoken, buried, and marginalized," says Irene Borger, Director of the Herb Alpert Award in the Arts. She describes why the 2018 panelists chose these five artists:
Dance
"The Dance panel was thrilled to select choreographer Okwui Okpokwasili for her profound, generous, and risk-taking work, and for the powerful way she poetically investigates and embodies joy, grief, desire, and the landscape of a woman of color with integrity, artistic intelligence and physical truth."
Film/Video
"The Film/Video panel honors artist Arthur Jafa, for his fierce, beautiful, courageous work with its profound understanding of the myriad issues that violently suppress individual freedom. His astute, at times crushing, juxtaposition of images and ideas, coupled with lyrical and syncopated editing embodies a grace and resilience that boldly confronts conditions of extremity and terror with hope."
Music
"Composer and pianist Courtney Bryan was chosen as the winner in Music for her impressive, deeply thought out, new cosmopolitan classical music imbued with fierce urgency of the moment as well as for her commitment to spirit and social justice, to shifting power dynamics and deep understanding of the effects of the human voice."
Theater
"Playwright Robert O’Hara was selected by the Theatre panel for his ferocious, funny, fearless, spiky, provocative work, his powerful, mature voice, formal chops, radical thinking and incredible rhythmic ear. The panel was ‘blown away’ by the ways he breaks all conventions, fiercely complicates the notion of race, and, in short, writes extraordinary plays that leap off the page."
Visual Arts
"Artist Michael Rakowitz was named the Visual Arts prizewinner for his bold and daring, deeply researched, deeply human work. Unearthing hidden histories, he makes art that speaks to a broad scope of social, political and economic issues which potently reflect our present moment, and create bridges across time and cultures."
Additional Information
Short film on the Herb Alpert Awards in the Arts:
https://vimeo.com/165191130
For more information about the Awards, please visit:
www.herbalpertawards.org
www.herbalpertfoundation.org
Herb Alpert Foundation media requests, contact:
Caroline Graham
C4 Global Communications
caroline@c4global.com
310 899 2727
ww.c4global.com