Tag Archives: emerging artists

Justine Otto: Phillips Collection Emerging Artist Prize

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Justine Otto with work_AW

Artist Justine Otto with her work recently acquired by The Phillips Collection.

This month, The Phillips Collection awarded its second Emerging Artist Prize, again selected from works on display at the (e)merge art fair, which closed October 5. This year’s winner is the 40-year-old Polish-born German artist Justine Otto, whose works were on view at the Hamburg-based gallery polarraum. Phillips Director Dorothy Kosinski, Senior Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art Vesela Sretenovič, and myself selected two small paintings by the artist: O.T. (Strich) and Ophto.

Otto.Justine_Emerging Artist Prize

Justine Otto, Ophto, 2014. Oil on canvas, 19.7 x 15.7 inches. Copyright Justine Otto

Justine Otto’s figurative paintings show some affinities with the so-called New Leipzig School of painting, although Otto studied at the Städelschule, the prestigious art academy in Frankfurt, and lives and works in Hamburg. Like the most prominent protagonist of the Leipzig school, Neo Rauch, Otto’s paintings, most of which are based on found photographs, owe some debt to both social realist painting and surrealism. However, Otto paints in a more expressionist style, with looser brushstrokes, and her paintings mostly depict women, children, and animals, creating narratives that are both puzzling and intriguing.

The oval–shaped painting O.T. (Strich) (Untitled, Line) depicts a group of children working on a long table suggestive of a classroom. The subtitle may refer to series of lines that frequently appear in Ottos’s paintings, giving her work a touch of conceptualism. Ophto features a young woman holding up an ophthalmological instrument to her right eye while standing in a forest. Both paintings evoke the style of German photographs from the 1940s.

Otto’s works are welcome additions to our growing holdings of contemporary German art, which include recent acquisitions by Wolfgang Laib, Walther Dahn, Franz Erhard Walther, Georg Baselitz, and Markus Lüpertz.

As in the previous year, the Phillips Emerging Artist Prize was made possible by the generous support of Hank and Carol Brown Goldberg.

Celebrating Pakistani Voices

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Images of Pakistani artists with their work and around The Phillips Collection

Top: Artists (left to right) Muhammed Zeeshan Younas, Sehr Jalil, Farah Khan, Naira Mushtaq, and Aneela Khursheed, in discussion with moderator Ambassador Stuart Holliday, Phillips Educator Rachel Goldberg, and US Department of State Regional Coordinating Officer Attia Nasar. Middle: At the reception after the panel, artists discussed their work with Georgetown University School of Foreign Service students and VIP guests including House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. Bottom: Panelists and artists Yusra Muhammad Baig, Sophia Mairaj Malik, Sumbal Mushtaq, Rabia Rabail, Ammar Savul, Ruby Guy Shah, Qurat Ul Ain, and Huma Arshad Warraich, with Pakistani artist, actor, and activist Jamal Shah. Photos: Pepe Gomez

In November, thirteen emerging artists whose work is featured in Pakistani Voices: In Conversation with The Migration Series visited the United States for an 11-day cultural exchange program, touring museums in DC and New York and also visiting one of the Phillips’s partner schools, Takoma Education Campus. Five of the artists participated on a panel at the Phillips to discuss their work with Rachel Goldberg in Pakistan and their trip to DC.

Artist Muhammed Zeeshan Younas shares his thoughts about what the experience has taught him:

  • For me art is not only for the artists—art is for everyone. Everyone should understand what you are trying to say through your artwork. That is why I’ve been learning all kind of tools of art—I started as a sculptor, and then I went to painting, and now I am working on videos and animation. Talking to so many people from kids to elders on this trip has inspired me—I say to them, “What inspires you? Who are you?” and they express themselves. Sometime they tell me about their problems, about what they like, what they dislike. I already know what people in my country think, and when I came here and talked to Americans, I really feel no difference, even from the kids. People are so friendly—they respond to me. And I want to incorporate this into my art because when we use the term social change, it means we need to know what our society needs and how to communicate these problems in art. Because art is for society so we must understand it what society wants and needs.