Ukrainian billionaire and art collector Victor Pinchuk has launched a new $100,000 award for artists under the age of 35. The Future Generation Art Prize will be given every two years and is open to any young artist who applies on line. A team of professionals will also be asked to nominate candidates producing exceptional work.
Under the aegis of his foundation, Pinchuk has assembled an international board that marries up patronage, money, glamour and star power - Los Angeles financier and collector Eli Broad, who also runs a foundation; Miuccia Prada the fashion designer and collector with her own art foundation in Milan; Elton John (Pinchuk rates his photography collection as one of the best in the world); and museum directors Richard Armstrong from the Solomon R Guggenheim Foundation and Museum and Glenn D. Lowry from the Museum of Modern Art.
Pinchuk is endeavouring to give his prize a point of difference over others like the Turner Prize and Hugo Boss Prize. With this in mind he has enlisted several established artists - Damien Hirst, Takashi Murakami, Andreas Gursky and Jeff Koons, artists whose work he collects - to serve as mentors for the finalists and winner.
Applications can be submitted from 18 January to 18 April 2010 at the Future Generation Art Prize website.
Image: Victor Pinchuk
