Winner of The Hotron Éigse Prize 2016 for an outstanding piece of work

VISUAL and St Patrick’s College Carlow

Hotron ART WORKS Prize Awards Party: 16 June, 8pm – All welcome

Carlow Arts Festival and VISUAL Carlow present ART WORKS, the 37th annual open submission exhibition and art prize. Running for 10 days at VISUAL and St Patrick’s College, in a quick burst, this exhibition celebrates the energy, creative power and diversity of visual arts practices in Ireland. It features work by artists selected from open submission as well as 5 invited artists; Stephen McKenna, Denis McNulty, Aideen Barry, Jaki Irvine and Brian Duggan.

This year ART WORKS has been selected by Annie Fletcher, Senior Curator, Van Abbe Museum, Eindhoven & Claire Feeley, Producer Barbican, London.

The Hotron Éigse Prize of €3000 for an outstanding piece of work and the Hotron ART WORKS prize of €1000 for work by a recent graduate was presented at the ART WORKS Party on June 16 at 8pm. Congratulations to this years two winners – The Hotron Eigse Prize went to  Alan Phelan and the Hotron ART WORKS prize went to recent graduate Katie Watchorn.

Selector Annie Fletcher had this to say:’Huge pleasure thank you to all of the artists who submitted to the exhibition – the sheer number who applied show how rich diverse and exciting visual arts practice is in Ireland today –we should feel very happy and encourage by this ( despite the governments  apparent indifference ) our community is alive and strong and deserves more support!  Worthy prize winners though extremely hard to choose.

I selected Alan Phelan with his extremely important new film work.  Delighted to see how rich the practice is and how its has developed and changed over the years into a refined sophisticated artistic vernacular . The rich film language developed here and focus on roger casement is important for some many reasons as we celebrate 1916  and is hugely timely and significant

Also really excited to nominate Katie Watchorn –  very interesting to see a rich and robust sculptural language developing – both sensitive in scale and form. Also very interesting to see artists tackling what is becoming more and more important both in our past and future –  our connection to the land.’Associated event

Little ART WORKS: Encouraging young audiences to enjoy the diversity and potential of the visual arts, for festival week exhibition tours and making workshops will be facilitated by Louise Osbourne.10th – 19th June (Weekdays, schools and groups only) | 10am & 1pmPrice: €2 per child