Hunter Emerging Art Prize

THE HEAP 2024 WINNERS HAVE BEEN ANNOUNCED!

ABOUT

The Hunter Emerging Art Prize 2024 (HEAP) is the leading art prize for emerging artists in the Hunter. Running for more than 20 years its intention is to support creatives at the early stages of their career.

This year Maclean's Booksellers is the major local sponsor alongside Sculptures at Scratchley, Stevens Conveyancing, This is Not Art, Frame Today, Print Studio by Frame Today, The Squires Family in memory of Jody Robinson and The Clay Room supporting the new ceramic addition to the prize.

Emerging artists living in the local government areas of Cessnock, Dungog, Lake Macquarie, Mid Coast, Maitland, Muswellbrook, Newcastle, Port Stephens, Singleton, Upper Hunter are welcome to enter. Entries can be made online by submitting images and a statement about your work. Only finalists will be required to deliver their actual works to Newcastle Art Space for judging and exhibition.

Check the definition of an emerging artist which you will see on the application form. We look forward to your entries!

Hunter Emerging Art Prize 2024 Timeline

Early-bird entries open: Thurs 7 December 2023 ($44 Early-bird fee / $55 Entry fee)

Early-bird entries close: Midnight Fri 5 January 2024

Entries close: Midnight Thurs 15 February 2024

Finalist announcement: Fri 1 March 2024
Delivery of finalists’ works: 10am - 2pm Wed 6 - Fri 8 March 2024
Winners announcement at the exhibition opening: 6-8pm Fri 22 March 2024
Prize exhibition: 22 March - 14 April 2024
Collection of unsold works: 10am - 2pm Wed 17 - Fri 19 April 2024

Entry Fee

Early-bird (closes midnight 5 Jan 2024): $44

Standard entry fee: $55

Maximum two entries per artist.

Entry fees are non-refundable.

PRIZE MONEY

The total prize pool is more than $10,000 with prizes offered across diverse artforms.

Overall Prize: $5000 Sponsored by MacLean's Booksellers

The Overall Prize will be awarded to the best work across all Sections.

Youth Prize: $1000 Sponsored by the Squires Family in memory of Jody Robinson

The Youth Prize will be awarded to the best work across all sections by an artist aged under 25.

People's Choice Award: $100 gift voucher Sponsored by Eckersley's

The People’s Choice Award will be based on votes received throughout exhibition from gallery visitors and online, and will be announced at the end of the exhibition.

MEET THE JUDGES

Matthew Watts

MATTHEW WATTS is a curator at Newcastle Art Gallery, Australia. Formerly an Assistant Curator at Tate, Matthew most recently curated the ‘Turner Prize 2022’, and the ‘Radical Landscapes’ exhibition for the Art Explora Mobile Museum as a national first. Working in the International Partnerships program, Matthew has co-curated a range of major touring exhibitions at Tate including ‘Light’, ‘Millais’ Ophelia’; and ‘The Dynamic Eye’.

Previously Matthew worked at the National Portrait Gallery, London; the Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Venice; and was a Board Member of the Art Association of Australia and New Zealand Executive Committee. Matthew graduated with first class honours in Masters of Art Curatorship from the University of Melbourne.

Edwardo Milan

EDWARDO MILAN completed post graduate studies in Sculpture at the University of Newcastle in 1988. He has exhibited widely in Australia and is represented in the Newcastle Art Gallery collection. He exhibited in the inaugural Sculptures at Scratchley and has been a finalist in the Kilgour Art Prize, The North Sydney Art Prize, including highly Commended at The Kangaroo Valley Sculpture Prize.

My artwork comes from an obsession of making things by hand and referencing the everyday, the commonplace, not the high tech manufactured cool, this is the raw, the hands on, the gritty world of making things that talk about the who, the how and the why of us.

Edwardo Milan teaches at TAFE NSW Newcastle Art School across the Visual Arts and is an advisor on the Public Art Reference Group for Newcastle Council.

Brontë Naylor

BRONTË NAYLOR’S interdisciplinary practice is based in expanded collage; bringing together painting, photography, social practice, and spatial installation. Naylor holds a Bachelors in Creative Industries with Honours graduating first class. The artist has cemented herself within the public art landscape across Australia and is emerging Internationally. Her practice-led research is a continuous dialogue between studio practice and the Antipodean public and private space. Using post-post-studio methodologies, Naylor questions society's validation of authority and hierarchy of place, resources, and expressions of outward positivity in the face of a contrasting reality.

Brontë Naylor is a studio artist at The Creator Incubator, has worked on national and international mural and creative projects, and was part of the NAS Mentorship 2022-2023 alongside Peter Gardiner.

Image credit: Photograph by Wednesday Sutherland