The Juvenars-IESA Prize took place from April 6 to 9, 2021 at the IESA Gallery, where this year’s 21 candidate artists were able to present a work.
The artist Bowen Zhao won it among 21 competing artists with his work Zhang San.
The other artists:
Assoukrou Aké, Carla Barkat, Elsa Belbacha-Lardy, Jules Bourbon, Camille Chastang, Corentin Darré, Bryce Delplanque, Camille Derniaux, Quentin Fromont, Valentine Gardiennet, Éloïse Glet, Alex Huthwhol, Koré Lechat-Ménard, Anna Lhospital, Adèle Meuriot, Élise Nguyen-Quoc, Camille Sauer, Camille Screve, Ludivine Zambon, Bowen Zhao and Sarah Zerguine.
The prize is dedicated to young creation and is open to an artist under thirty without a gallery.
The winner receives the 5000 euro endowment, a solo show at the IESA gallery and presents a work at a contemporary art fair.
It is organized by first-year Art Market students under the direction of Maud Prangey: the class is split in 2, one half handling the implementation of the Prize and the other organizing an auction that will provide the 5000 euro endowment.
This year’s jury was made up of Ms. Chaima BEN HAJ ALI, Director of the association Quartier Monde, secretary and cultural advisor at the Fédération de l’Art Urbain, Mr. Jean FAUCHEUR, President of the Fédération de l’Art Urbain, artist and co-founder of the association le M.U.R, Mr. Claude FAIN, Director of the Asia Now fair, Mr. Stéphane PENCREAC’H, Artist, Mr. Boris GREBILLE, Director of IESA arts et Culture, Ms. Maud PRANGEY, Communications Manager at IESA and project coach for the B1s, Ms. Emma ROUSSEAU, advisor for 1st-year Art Market students.
About Bowen Zhao:
Bowen ZHAO, born in 1993 in Luoyang (China), holds a DNA from the École supérieure d’art et de design TALM-Tours, and lives and works in TOURS.
Taking a gaze that is as melancholic as it is poetic on the individual and the city, as well as on the cultural issues of Chinese society, his work deploys a range of very universal questions about identity, globalization, the paradigms of rural exodus, the relationship to work and youth, the feeling of security and the alienation of individuals. His works, in short, seek to understand what determines our sense of belonging in a globalized society. To build his work, he follows an approach based on three notions: “home” (which represents the ideal), “work” (which represents the means, the act of sacrifice) and “identity” (which represents what is sacrificed).
ZHANG SAN 2019-2020
Wood, fabric, texts - 64 x 51 x 13 cm - Installation
Zhang San is a generic name, designating an ordinary person, a banal name “stamped” on the common people who roam big cities. ZHANG SAN is a short story in which he sets out twelve fictional testimonies of young people who left their native countryside to work in factories in big cities.
