May 2021 Winners · Art Prof

This video shows the results of the 2021 May Art Dare: “Abstract Art à la Carte,” where participants were asked to pick 1 tool + 1 surface + 1 shape and create abstract artworks from your own visual “menu.” Experimentation with surfaces, shapes and tools were encouraged for abstract art making. Discussion led by Art Prof Clara Lieu.

Watch the Announcement

Prize Winner

Anne Guiriec (France)
@anne_guiriec

“First abstract artwork of my life, I feared to be overwhelmed. I felt that strong shape and surface would talk to me, and guide my hand and mind in the process, as if I was a cave woman painting in Pech-Merle. So I took time to prepare, with cheap brown paper, a bunch of expressive surfaces, some in random shapes, some molded in a square-ish form I built.
I felt my painting as a dialogue, all I had to do was to answer to the shape and surface. It was sometimes hard to answer accurately with one tool (bubble plastic wrap was not very versatile), but such fun ! I spent this month painting abstract, thinking abstract, questioning myself on what is abstract, what is representation, is there any clear limit between one and the other… Very educational, thanks to this artdare.”
Anne Guiriec

Honorable Mention

Marijke De Belder (Germany)
@artdebelder

In May 2021 I became interested in seaweed as an art material and I tried to integrate it in the backgrounds of drawings. Then the material came to the foreground and I made a bas-relief and seaweed sculptures. Weaving the sculptures is an intuitive process. I just keep weaving until the sculpture somehow speaks to me. Sadly, the sculptures only last a few hours, so I started to focus more on the pictures, turning them into abstract still life prints. I made one from scratch for this purpose and one still life is a cannibalisation of an earlier picture.

To me the appeal lies in the unique texture and light reflection of the material. It is also abstract art that tricks your mind in being figurative, like clouds and Rorschach inkblots do. I see ravens, dragons, bugs, wasps, horses,… Thanks at Prof Lieu and Deepti Menon for the mentoring!
Marijke De Belder