Right To Live Versus The Law Of Death by Jarrett Mitchell, joint winner of the East 06 Award. © the artist
Norwich Gallery at Norwich School of Art and Design is showing some of the finest contemporary art in Europe at East International, its major open submission exhibition.
East runs until August 19 2006 and features work from more than 25 artists selected by Turner Prize-winner Jeremy Deller and renowned curator Dirk Snauwaert.
The exhibition has run every year since 1991 and has become one of the most respected open submission events in the art calendar. This year has seen the £5,000 East 06 show award divided between exhibitors Jarrett Michael and Ruth Ewan.
Get Off Your Knees! by show winner Ruth Ewan - the design appears on East International's t-shirt. © the artist
Jarrett Mitchell, from Louisville, Kentucky, created a celebration of the white tailed deer in her installation featuring a taxidermied deer and video documentary exploring the artist’s unique perspective on the subject. Ruth Ewan’s work looks at Robert Kett’s 1549 rebellion against the enclosure of common land.
Potential exhibitors were invited to submit their work by December 2005 after which Deller and Snauwaert had the tricky task of picking the works for exhibition, with a total of 1,059 entrants from more than 30 countries.
Along with the award-winners they selected works by artists like Keith Farquhar, whose installation 33 Red Hooded Figures Pass Judgment reflects on the clothing of our society and Masayuki Suzuki, who reflects on what is real, what is pain and what is scary, using his own body as a tool to explore and highlight these issues.
Keith Farquhar's 33 Red Hooded Figures Pass Judgment reflects on our society's clothing. © the artist
Jeremy Deller won the Turner Prize for contemporary art in 2004 for Memory Bucket, a video about US President George Bush’s home town in Texas.
Dirk Snauwaert is Artistic Director of Wiels, the major new art venue due to open in Brussels at the end of 2006 and has previously been curator at the Palais des Beaux Arts in Brussels, the Kunstverein in Munich and the IAC at Villeurbanne in France.
Visitors to East can also buy artist designed carrier bags, t-shirts, CDs, records, and signed posters, only available at Norwich Gallery.
