On Friday, September 3, was solemnly opened the VI. Textile Art of Today, which again brings an innovative view of traditional art techniques with an emphasis on the environment. The opening also included the awarding of prestigious awards. Until 14th of November, the international exhibition of contemporary textile art presents works by 83 artists from all continents. After this exposure in Danubiana Meulensteen Art Museum, the exhibition will move to Budapest, from there to Poprad, then to the Polish town of Bielsko-Biała, and its pilgrimage will end in Uherské Hradiště in Czech republic.

“Datingsite”: expression of inner desires

Grand Prix of Božena Augustínová travels to the Netherlands, thanks to the artist Anneke Klein. She received it for her work Datingste: an expression of inner desires, which is a combination of hand weaving, embroidery and painting on an area of ​​270 x 85 cm. The work compares the levels of establishing a personal relationship with food (as the two main motives of life) and at the conclusion of a relationship on dating. “I was interested in how we see ourselves, what we want to be, what we feel attracted to and with what expectations, what the consequences and personal boundaries are, whether relationships are sustainable or fleeting, and with whom and when we make contact,” said Anneke Klein about her work. She came in person to the Opening of the exhibition of contemporary textiles in Danubiana.

The work consists of 726 logos, which represent pictures of people on datingsites and form the basis for establishing a relationship. They are arranged in a solid pattern regardless of the person. “My work is the result of teamwork and I don’t even know exactly how long it took to create it. But I knew one thing that when I started with it, I couldn’t stop until more than seven hundred logos were created as symbols of specific people.” And how did Anneke react to the prestigious award? “When I found out, I gasped and was speechless. I am very honored by the award, because this event has a high artistic level even in comparison with other art shows in Europe, and this year there are a number of inspiring works of art.”

Evil Twin and Locked-Down

One of the Excellent Awards was personally accepted by Danish artist Dorte Jensen. She won t for the works The Evil Twin and Locked-down, which are created from applications made of small pieces of thread. These are hand-cut and sewn on a sewing machine. The work The Evil Twin is a humorous dialogue of twins connected by an electric wire. This leads from a hair clipper holding a frightened twin on the left side (without hair) to the left hand of the other twin with an ironic smile (with hair) shown on the right side. The locked-down is again inspired by the pandemic of the new coronavirus and depicts the faces of two young people, while the locked-down is symbolized by black bands running down their faces. Each face consists of three boxes, one with four pairs of eyes, the other with a nose and the third with four different mouths. By rotating, it is then possible to make 16 different expressions on each face. “What inspired me? The specific faces of people and their emotions evoked by this wonderful time,” replies Dorte Jensen, who completed her work at the end of last year. “Of course, I’m honestly surprised by the award. I also had an artwork here three years ago and even then I wanted to return to this beautiful place by the Danube. In addition, I am now very happy to have received an award at this great event.”

Expert jury awards

The expert jury consisted of: Andrej Augustín (director of the Textile Art of Today), Vladimír Beskid (director of the J. Koniark Gallery in Trnava), Ľudovít Petránsky (member of the preparatory committee of the Textile Art of Today), Ondrej Rudavský (multimedia artist) and Júlia Sabová (curator of the exhibition, Academy of Fine Arts, Bratislava).

Vladimír Beskid: “The award criteria are simple, but also difficult. The first thing is, of course, the quality of the work. Then it is a special story, an innovation in authoring techniques and also a position of intermediate overlap. In our evaluation, we tried to take all these aspects into account. It is always about the discussion in the expert jury, as well as the issue of compromise in the first five or six positions in which the awards were decided. It was important for me that such a competition took place in these challenging conditions in Slovakia at all, and I firmly hope that the level of the exhibton will continue to rise and continue in the future.”

Ondrej Rudavský: “I am excited about the level of this exhibition. There are many valuable and interesting works, which pleasantly surprised me. Personally, I also work in interactive media and I am glad that at this exhibition I was able to immerse myself in the world of new techniques that move traditional textiles into current technologies.”

Awards for VI. Textile Art of Today

GRAND PRIX OF BOŽENA AUGUSTÍNOVÁ

  • Anneke KLEIN (Netherlands)

EXCELLENT AWARD

  • Zuzana NEVŘIVOVÁ (Czech Republic)
  • Dorte JENSEN (Denmark)
  • Włodzimierz CYGAN (Poland)

VISEGRAD AWARD

Award for crossing borders in the field of textile production

  • Fiona KIRKWOOD (South Afrika)

ENVIRO AWARD

  • Carol ECKERT (USA)

TATRA GALLERY AWARD

  • Katarína MAROŠIOVÁ (Slovakia)

POLISH INSTITUTE AWARD

  • Karolina LIZUREJ (Poland)

DANUBIANA MEULENSTEEN ART MUSEUM AWARD

  • Renáta ORMANDÍKOVÁ (Slovakia)

STUDENT AWARD

  • Írem AKDEMÍR (Turkey)