About the Winners: Mid-Career Artist and Curator Awards 2022
November 3, 2022
Get to know the laureates of this year's Visual Arts Awards! Read on for bios and quotes from this impressive pair!
Hajra Waheed
The Hnatyshyn Foundation Visual Arts Award of $25,000
Awarded annually to a Canadian mid-career artist who has demonstrated excellence and innovation in their body of work and who shows promise of outstanding artistic achievement in the years ahead.
Hajra Waheed’s multidisciplinary practice ranges from painting and drawing to video, sound, sculpture and installation. Amongst other issues, she explores the nexus between security, surveillance and the covert networks of power that structure lives, while also addressing the traumas and alienation of displaced subjects affected by legacies of colonial and state violence. Characterized by a distinct visual language and unique poetic approach, her works often use the ordinary as a means to convey the profound, and landscape as a medium to transpose human struggle and a radical politics of resistance and resilience.
Waheed has participated in exhibitions worldwide including: Hum (2020) Portikus, Frankfurt (2020); Globale Resistance, Centre Pompidou, Paris (2020); Lahore Biennial 02, Pakistan (2020); Pushing Paper: Contemporary Drawing from 1970 to Now, British Museum, London (2019); Hold Everything Dear, The Power Plant, Toronto (2019); 57th Venice Biennale, VIVA ARTE VIVA, Venice (2017); 11th Gwangju Biennale, South Korea (2016); The Cyphers, BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead, UK (2016); Still Against the Sky, KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin (2015); La Biennale de Montréal, Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal, Quebec (2014); Lines of Control, Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, Ithaca, NY (2012) and (In) The First Circle, Antoni Tapies Foundation, Barcelona, ES (2012). She was a finalist for the 2016 Sobey Art Award and received the 2014 Victor Martyn Lynch-Staunton Award for outstanding achievement as a mid-career artist. Waheed’s works can be found in permanent collections including MOMA, New York; British Museum, London; the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa; the Centre Pompidou, Paris; the Art Institute of Chicago; Burger Collection, Zurich/Hong Kong and Devi Art Foundation, New Delhi.
“What a surprise to receive this news out of the blue on a day that seemed like most others. So much of our practice is carried out in the magic of quiet, solitary moments. I was incredibly humbled by and grateful for this kind gesture - to be suddenly tapped on the shoulder by peers and urged to look up for a moment, to be appreciated for what we do as artists, and to have acknowledged that what we do matters. This winding journey that is a life long practice, is not possible without the continued loving support of people and communities both near and far. This award is shared with all those I have had the great honour to collaborate with.”
Michelle Jacques
The Hnatyshyn Foundation Award for Curatorial Excellence of $15, 000
Awarded annually to a Canadian mid-career curator of contemporary visual art in recognition of their contribution to the advancement of the contemporary visual arts in Canada.
Michelle Jacques is the Head of Exhibitions and Collections and Chief Curator at Remai Modern, Saskatoon. Her curatorial work has consistently examined the intersections of contemporary practices with historical art and community engagement.
Recent and upcoming projects at Remai Modern include Ken Lum: Death and Furniture (co-curated with Johan Lundh, 2022) and Denyse Thomasos: just beyond (co-curated with Renee van de Avoird and Sally Frater, upcoming 2022-23), both co-organized with the Art Gallery of Ontario; Canoe, an exhibition exploring how works of art documenting the structure and usage of Indigenous vessels has played a role in carrying cultural knowledge forward; and The Middle of Everywhere, an exploration of the art of the Great Plains collaboratively developed by the Remai Modern curatorial team.
Previously, Jacques was Chief Curator at the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, where she was responsible for guiding a curatorial and education program linking contemporary practices, ideas and issues to the Gallery's Emily Carr collection and other historical holdings and legacies. Over the course of her career, she has worked with numerous contemporary artists including Karma Clarke-Davis, Karen Henderson, Luis Jacob, Gwen MacGregor, Kori Newkirk, Jon Sasaki, Rodney Sayers and Emily Luce, and Hiraki Sawa and co-curated major retrospectives of the work of Anna Banana and Jock Macdonald. Before moving west, she held roles in the Contemporary and Canadian departments of the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto; was the Director of Programming at the Centre for Art Tapes in Halifax; and taught courses in writing, art history and curatorial studies at NSCAD University, University of Toronto Mississauga, and OCAD University. Jacques has served on numerous boards and committees, and is currently a director at large with Vtape and the Vice-President of Inclusion and Outreach with the Association of Art Museum Curators.
“It is a profound honour to receive this award from the Hnatyshyn Foundation. Over the course of my career, my curatorial practice, while centred on contemporary art, has often incorporated or intersected with modern and historical practices and concerns. However, it has always been with the aim of growing the appreciation for today’s artists, and for making space for new audiences. I am so grateful that this work has been recognized by a jury of my esteemed colleagues.”
