Multimedia Artist Maree Clarke, through the artistic celebration of her Aboriginal roots, was announced as the winner of the $60,000 Melbourne Prize for Urban Sculpture 2023 last Wednesday night, Nov. 15, at the city's Federation Square.
Awarded by the Melbourne Prize Trust, the annual prize acknowledges remarkable artists of great caliber, who have inspired creativity and community development through their body of work, by funding their artistic projects.
For Clarke, this award has enabled her to aim her sights on a big project: a 10ft to 13ft long glass canoe that consists of over 20 suspended sections fashioned after the beguiling patterns of a microscopic river reed. She plans to display the artwork on the ceiling of the Vivien Anderson Gallery on St. Kilda Road.
"It will be beautiful, but I'm still trying to get my head around the size and scale," Clarke shared in a statement to The Guardian.
How Maree Clarke Won the Annual Melbourne Prize
The judges for the award consist of Emily Floyd, an Australian artist specializing in public art; Kate ten Buuren, a curator for the First Nations Art Collective; and Katharina Prugger, a contemporary art curator for the National Gallery of Victoria.
According to them, Clarke won the prize due to her recent experimental venture of utilizing glass in her sculpture work. In fact, in 2023, the multimedia artist spent time as a resident artist for the Pilchuck Glass School in Washington, US.
In addition to this expertise, the judges placed importance on Clarke's three-decade-worth contribution to Victoria State's indigenous art scene, helming the frontier of the locality's art community to nurture and promote the diverse art by contemporary Southeast Aboriginal artists.
Maree Clarke's Works and Her Aboriginal Heritage
Clarke with her Mutti Mutti, Yorta Yorta, and BoonWurrung or Wemba Wemba roots, has created artworks in varying mediums that explore the differing anthropological aspects of her ancestors' identity.
These pieces have been acquired by prestigious Australian institutions which include the National Gallery of Australia, the National Museum of Australia, and the National Gallery of Victoria.
The NGV was also responsible for staging the first-ever exhibit of a living "First Nations" artist in 2021, which was Clarke's "Ancestral Memories" show at The Ian Potter Centre in Federation Square.
Spotted after dark @fed.square: Maree Clarke’s ‘Ritual and Ceremony’. See this series of 84 portraits on display in Maree Clarke: Ancestral Memories now open at The Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia, Fed Square. Free entry. #NGV #NAIDOCWeek #NAIDOC2021 pic.twitter.com/ith51AInM4
— NGV (@NGVMelbourne) July 4, 2021
Clarke competed for the 2023 prize against her fellow finalists Indigenous sculptor Kent Morris, ceramicist Vipoo Srivilasa, and installation artist Joy Zou.
