The 2022 Mosman Art Prize – Australia’s oldest and most recognised local government art award has been awarded to Fremantle-based artist Jacobus Capone.
Capone has won the $50,000 acquisitive prize for Spring 2021, a unique painting consisting of fallen golden wattle and seawater, creating an ethereal pigment wash. It now enters the celebrated Mosman Art Collection, a valuable and historic collection that surveys Australian painting since 1947. Capone’s practice spans performance-based video works, photography, installation and painting. His winning entry Spring 2021 embodies his ever-present examination of the environment, using falling golden wattle and seawater that was collected each day, the combination of materials creates a glowing, shimmering yellow wash that encases the canvas.
Capone says: “Each day of October 2021 a daily ritual was adhered to. Fallen golden wattle was collected at dawn. Seawater at dusk. An infusion from the two sources was made each night to make a painterly wash in honour of the spring landscape. A specific paint for that day, sourced from a different tree, a different location. 29 washes were made, indicative of Spring. They were applied individually on a daily basis to the canvas”.
About Jacobus Capone
Jacobus is an Australian artist based in Walyalup Fremantle, WA. He maintains a practice that incorporates performance, photography, video installation, painting and site-specific work. Characteristically poetic there is a holistic nature to his undertakings which increasingly attempt to integrate all action, however percieved by others, into the wholeness of one lived experience. He has received a Bachelor of Visual Arts from Edith Cowan University in 2007, graduating with a work that saw him cross Australia by foot, to pour water from the Indian Ocean into the Pacific (which he carried each day on the 147-day journey). His work has been shown in a range of institutions both nationally and internationally including Aichi Prefectural Museum of Art Gallery (Japan), Taipei Fine Arts Museum (Taiwan), TarraWarra Museum of Art (Australia) and many more.
Capone was presented with the first prize of $50,000 by 2022 judge Rhana Devenport ONZM, Director of the Art Gallery of South Australia, at the exhibition opening on the evening of Friday 26 August at Mosman Art Gallery, Sydney.
Commenting on the winner work, Rhana Devenport ONZM says: “Fremantle-based artist Jacobus Capone has earned great respect over recent years for his attentive time-based works that take the measure of time and register human presence in the natural environment. These works often involve the artist’s own quiet performative actions. This transcendent work, simply entitled Spring 2021, extends the possibility of painting by bypassing the intermediary medium of conventional paint itself, in favour of embracing the pure form of natural substances gathered through circadian performance. Each day in October 2021 a daily ritual was adhered to by the artist; fallen wattle was collected at dawn, seawater at dusk, these substances were coalesced each evening to form a painterly wash and a painting was made; collectively and individually, they celebrate the onset of spring”.
Further awards presented on the night included the Margaret Olley Commendation Award ($6,000) given to Dianne Tchumut (Mulingi, NT), the Allan Gamble Award (for built environment) valued at $3,000 won by Eliza Gosse (Sydney), and the Guy Warren Emerging Artists’ Award, $2,000 presented to Sebastian Galloway (Hobart).
The 2022 Mosman Art Prize attracted over 840 entries from across Australia with 91 paintings selected for the finalist exhibition.
Commenting on the exhibition this year, John Cheeseman, Director, Mosman Art Gallery says: “The quality of this year’s works is outstanding with this exhibition providing a national survey of contemporary painting practices. This year’s judge, Rhana Devenport ONZM, has reviewed all 845 submissions and has done a phenomenal job in selecting all 91 finalists and in adjudicating the winning entries. Artists should be thrilled by their achievement in being selected and audiences will be treated to seeing some of the most exciting artworks being made in Australia today.”
Mosman Mayor, Councillor Carolyn Corrigan says: “After its absence due to the pandemic in 2021, Mosman Council is proud to once again support the Prize and to demonstrate its continuing support of art and artists. Council is proud to present the 2022 Mosman Art Prize, the oldest and most prestigious municipal art award in Australia, and I personally congratulate all finalists.”
A total of $61,000 in prize money was awarded to artists across four categories:
Major Prize (acquisitive) $50,000 – Supported by Mosman Council
Winner: Jacobus Capone (Fremantle)
for Spring 2021, fallen golden wattle and seawater, 150 x 130 cm
Margaret Olley Commendation Award $6,000 – Supported by Gillian and the late Brian Jones
Winner: Dianne Tchumut (Mulingi, NT)
for Turtles Hibernating, synthetic polymer paint on linen, 210 x 90 cm
Allan Gamble Award $3,000 – Supported by Christine and the late Hugh Fraser
Winner: Eliza Gosse (Sydney)
for Almost Kareela, oil on canvas, 122 x 152 cm
Guy Warren Emerging Artists’ Award $2,000 – Supported by Fourth Village Providore
Winner: Sebastian Galloway (Hobart)
for Summer Arrangement in Suspended Animation, oil on copper, 90 x 75 cm
2022 Mosman Art Prize details:
- 75 Years of the Mosman Art Prize
- On show 27 August – 2 October 2022
- exhibiting at Mosman Art Gallery, 1 Art Gallery Way, Mosman NSW 2088
- Exhibition is free to the public
- Open 7 days, 10am – 4pm, open until 8pm on Wednesdays. Closed public holidays
- Public programs will include artist talks
- Visitors to the exhibition can vote for the Viewers’ Choice Award, which will be announced prior to the exhibition closing.
