Every three years the Augustinum Foundation awards the European Art Prize for Painting and Graphics in the Context of Intellectual Disability (Euward). This year’s winners have now been determined: Samaneh Atef, Desmond Tjon A Koy and Belén Sánchez. Only at the vernissage on May 16, 2024 in the Haus der Kunst, which is also the official awards ceremony, will it be announced who will take first, second and third place.
The Euward, which has been awarded to artists with cognitive disabilities since 2000, enjoys a worldwide reputation as it is the only Europe-wide award for contemporary, mentally disabled artists. Its international reputation is also reflected in the number of applicants: 240 artists from 25 countries submitted their works this year. From this, the Euward Board of Trustees put together a shortlist of 19 candidates, from which an international jury selected the three prize winners last Saturday.
The works of the three winners will be exhibited at Haus der Kunst in summer 2024
The self-taught outsider artist Samaneh Atef, born in Iran in 1989 and living in Lyon, tells in her pen and ink drawings the story of women from life giver to prisoner, from celebrated birther and healer to scapegoat. Her prize-winning colleague Desmond Tjon A Koy, born in Amsterdam in 1993, is of Ghanaian-Surinamese descent. He works with pencil and fineliner on topics related to black culture, religious history and music. Recently, his work has increasingly focused on the history and struggle for freedom of people of color.
The third artist is Belén Sánchez, born in Madrid in 1972, and has been a member of the Studio Debajo del Sombrero since 2008. The focus of her drawings, collages, sculptures and films is her own body, with which she tells stories of aggression and healing. As a performer, she slips into the role of both evil and good, wanders through abysses of violence, but always resolves the moral conflicts positively.
The works of the three artists will be on display at Haus der Kunst from May 17 to July 14, 2024. In addition to the monographic exhibition, they are supported with cash prizes and a catalog worth a total of around 25,000 euros.