finalist Judges
Braddon Snape
Dr Braddon Snape is a nationally recognised Newcastle NSW based artist who specialises in three-dimensional practice including large-scale public artworks. Over the past 27 years Snape has developed a practice utilising a diverse range of media that now encompasses sculpture, installation, video, and performance, earning Snape a reputation for conceptually rich works revealed through a minimal aesthetic and an astute understanding and sensitivity to materials, media, and site. His current practice interrogates a dangerously exciting and new method of inflating steel. This performative process developed whilst researching for his PhD gives Snape’s work a renewed freedom, where it reveals a delicate dialogue between control and chance that has been aptly described as Action Sculpture. Snape’s recent addition of crafted light has added another dimension to his ever-evolving practice.
Highlights include: Winner of the Lake Prize 2022; Blake Prize finalist 2022; Things are not as they appear (Smoke and Mirrors), Nanda Hobbs Sydney and Grafton Regional Gallery 2021; An Act of Restraint, Nanda Hobbs Sydney 2019; Internal Pressure, The LockUp Contemporary Art Space, Newcastle 2019; Clouds Gathering, Public artwork commissioned by Maitland City Council for The Riverlink Building 2018; International Sculpture Festa 2012, Seoul, South Korea; Woollahra Small Sculpture Prize Finalist 2009; McClelland Sculpture Survey Award Finalist 2007; Sculpture by the Sea, Bondi 2003-2015.
Snape accumulated over 20 years as a teacher of Sculpture/installation at Newcastle Art School, The University of Newcastle, and UNSW Art & Design. In 2017 he established The Creator Incubator, a lively arts hub featuring studios housing 37 artists and two contemporary gallery space, in Newcastle.
Kim Blunt
Kim Blunt is currently a Senior Curator at Maitland Regional Art Gallery, bringing a wealth of experience in the arts. Kim holds numerous qualifications, including a Bachelor of Arts (Visual Arts), a Bachelor of Fine Art (Hons), and Graduate Diploma in Education. With a robust skill set that includes Curating, Art History, Grant Writing, Visual Arts, Museum Collections and more, Kim is a highly qualified judge.
FIRST ROUND JUDGES
Jann Kesby
Drawing inspiration from her surroundings on the north coast of NSW, Jann plays with textures and neutral colours to create functional tableware for the considered home.
Jann’s training began in a production workshop on the outskirts of Sydney during the 1970’s with hands on practical training. This was followed by a traineeship at Sturt Craft Workshops, Mittagong – the first production workshop established in Australia.
Following her traineeship, Jann moved back to the Mid North Coast of NSW where she established her own workshop, specialising in wood firing.
Jann has gained Certificate IV in Visual Arts, taught in Arts & Media through TAFE NSW, presented at and attended workshops, conferences and residences internationally. She was the manager and coordinator of the Dunghutti Ngaku Aboriginal Art Gallery from 2009 to 2018.
Jann’s work is held in public and private collections throughout Australia and internationally
Michael Sprott
Artist – Curator – Installer
Michael is a Sydney-based artist, working predominately in transparent resins. His works explore repetition and variation in nature through changes in sculptural forms.
His work can be seen at michaelsprott.net
He has exhibited in a variety of gallery and outdoor exhibitions including:
Sydney Botanic Gardens – Fungi x Botanica – 2021
Be Brave Gallery – Avalon – 2020
Sydney Pop Gallery – Hunters Hill 2019, Mosman 2020
Sculpture@Bayside – 2019
He is currently working with Artspace Gallery, Woolloomooloo and National Art School, Biennale of Sydney, Articulate Gallery Leichhardt, and See Street Gallery, Meadowbank
Steve Pickering
Steve Pickering has been heavily involved in the arts in the Clarence Valley, both as a gallery owner and also a committee member on the Clarence Valley Cultural Committee. As president of Ulmarra Village Inc (the Ulmarra progress association), he organised community events which were a wonderful way to bring the community together during the days of COVID.
He opened the Coldstream Gallery in the historic river-port village of Ulmarra, with his partner, in 2017. As an advocate of local artists and creatives, he realises the importance of the creative arts and associated industries. Steve has been an invited judge at art competitions including the Jacaranda Art Exhibition, Wild about Wooli and the Lilli Pilli Art Show, amongst others. Steve is currently a board member and treasurer of Arts Northern Rivers as well as a first-term councillor on the Clarence Valley Council, where his aim is to strengthen the focus on arts, culture, heritage and youth within the Clarence Valley and Northern Rivers region. The importance of arts and culture in repairing and rebuilding communities can not be underestimated. Arts are the glue that brings communities together.
Marc McIntyre:
I have been co-owner of the Coldstream Gallery since 2017 and have been immersed in the arts and culture of the Northern Rivers. Since moving to the region, I have judged many art competitions including The Lilli Pilli Art prize, The Wooli art show, Grafton art clubs Jacaranda art competition to name a few. I have strong passion for supporting local artists/artisans and providing an engaging space for them to display their work and to promote the amazing local talent to a wider audience via the Coldstream Gallery. I am also very keen to encourage young emerging artists and artisans to follow their artistic passions and support them from the onset of an idea through to representation on a commercial level.
Arts and culture are far more important to life than a lot of people realise and I endeavour to promote and enjoy what it has to offer. I have had the pleasure of knowing and supporting many friends and family over the last 40 years in their artistic practices and have always enjoyed watching them evolve and grow in their field of practice.