People's Choice and Packers' Prize - Nillumbik Prize for Contemporary Art 2021

Difficult, Arrayah Loynd, 2020, archival inkjet print on cotton rag paper, 21 x 200 x 1cm

Montsalvat is proud to announce the winners of both the People’s Choice Award and the Packers’ Prize for the Nillumbik Prize for Contemporary Art 2021.

The People’s Choice Award of $500, sponsored by Montsalvat, was awarded to Arrayah Loynd for her piece, Difficult.

Below is the artist statement courtesy of Arrayah Loynd:
”A return to and reclamation of our rebellious nature - of being difficult women that refuse to be silenced.
Difficult is a project inspired by an Emily Dickinson poem They shut me up in Prose, and the way language and words are used against women to silence their voice and quell discussion. The long-term goal of this project is to include a more diverse and intersectional response to the female experience in relation to gendered language and power.”

The Packers’ Prize, selected by Montsalvat’s volunteers and staff, was awarded to Linda Judge for her piece, Our Daily Bread.

Below is the artist statement courtesy of Linda Judge:
”I began to collect bread tags after seeing photographs of malnourished marine birds that had died after ingesting small fragments of plastic. When a Birch tree in my garden died after the drought I combined the tags and tree into a series of objects. The bread tags, each with a use-by-date, are a call to arms for our environment, and a plea to return to a time when consumption was based on need.”

Our Daily Bread (detail), Linda Judge, 2019, wood, recycled plastic, 2 parts: 102 x 50 x 50cm and 80 x 20 x 20cm