The forum was attended on behalf of the ASV by John Wooller and Jenny Rickards. This is the second gathering of groups involved in running public sculpture exhibitions and prizes. The topic of this meeting was sustainability. The issue of concern – not so much the environmental sustainability of sculpture practice as the sustainability of the exhibitions themselves. The event was hosted by Toyota and coincided with the opening of their annual sculpture exhibition this year entitled Cryptozoology and the announcement of the Toyota 2008 Community Spirit Artist Travel Award.
Our luncheon speaker was Yvonne von Hartel AM, director of ConnectEast who outlined the selected, construction and placement of the sculptures on Eastlink. Then Carol Atwell, Brecknock Consulting led into the issues of sustainability in terms of the sculptors' input to the major events such as the McClelland and Lempriere Prizes. She also alluded to vandalism, the long term capacity to support prize money and briefly touched on a “green star” rating for sculpture which is likely to be a future consideration.
William Eicholtz gave us the artists' perspective. He indicated the persistence needed to achieve recognition and the costs involved. He reminded the group of the reasons sculptors enter for these prizes with so little chance of reward, and listed the benefits that should accrue to make the effort valuable to the artist. These include adequate publicity and recording of the exhibition, an individual exhibition website capable of fielding discussion, appropriate assistance with transport and installation and acknowledgement as the important part of the show – too often the sponsors get the red carpet treatment while the artists are left out in the cold.
The organisers of the Lempriere Prize and the McClelland Prize then gave us some insights into the strategic changes to their respective events.
This frankness of discussion clearly indicates the value of Savaad Felich's work in bringing the forum together. The next forum will be hosted by Malcolm Thompson best known to me as curator of the Toorak Sculpture Festival.
Jenny Rickards
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