A documentary photographer from Saint John, N.B., a Toronto-based artist who shoots through a diasporic lens, and a Vancouver-based artist who shapes social and political understanding through photography and appropriation are the recipients of the 2021 New Generation Photography Award. The award, in its fourth year, recognizes Canadian artists 35 years of age and under working in lens-based art, with the aim of elevating their careers.
The winners each receive $10,000, and the opportunity to show their work in two group exhibitions: an outdoor exhibition at Ryerson University in Toronto during the Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival held from April 30 – October 3, 2021, in Toronto, and at the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa in the Fall (COVID-19 restrictions permitting). They will also receive mentoring by the curatorial team at the National Gallery of Canada and have their work included in artist talks, exhibition tours and educational programming. The 2020 and 2021 winners will present their works together at both group exhibitions.
“Congratulations to the three winners of the 2021 Scotiabank New Generation Photography Award,” says Laura Curtis Ferrera, Chief Marketing Officer at Scotiabank. “Each of them is creating important and beautiful art that tells a story about the world around them. We are proud to champion this award with the National Gallery of Canada that helps to elevate the careers of our country’s most promising lens-based artists.”
The winners
Photo credit: Dustin Brons, Smoke, 2019, Video 12 min 32 s. Collection of the artist. © Dustin Brons. Installation view, photo: Maximilian Schmoetzer
Headshot by Dustin Brons.
Dustin Brons: As an emerging artist living in Vancouver, Brons appropriates everyday, ready-made materials from the Vancouver urban landscape to address a social and political understanding of climate change and gentrification through visual art — photographs, videos and text.
“An intriguing facet of this work is that [Brons] places Vancouver as a subject, as opposed to an object for its natural beauty and re-inscribes landscape photography with layers of conceptual framing, the found image, and perhaps the poor image,” Dana Claxton, Head and Associate Professor of Art History, Visual Art and Theory Department at the University of British Columbia, wrote in nominating him for the award.
A concrete example of this is Brons’s Smoke (BC, 2017-2018), which uses a variety of images culled from social media depicting a smoke-filled Vancouver skyline during record-breaking forest fires on the West coast to create a video, or slideshow, statement about climate change.
However, Brons said he doesn’t see appropriation in the same way as artists in the 1970s or 80s did. “That gesture was somehow radical and an important part of their work,” he told Perspectives. “Me using that strategy now is more to do with it being the most direct, economical way of using art to address an important issue.”
Brons has a Master of Fine Arts from UC San Diego, a Bachelor of Fine Arts from UBC, and recently participated in the Whitney Independent Study Program.
Photo credit: Chris Donovan, Objects in Mirror, 2019, inkjet print. Collection of the artist. © Chris Donovan
Headshot by Giovanni Capriotti.
Chris Donovan: A documentary photographer, Donovan splits his time between Toronto and his hometown of Saint John. His latest project, The Cloud Factory, (Cover picture: Chris Donovan, Dog with Pipeline, 2019, inkjet print. Collection of the artist. © Chris Donovan) tells the narrative of what it means to live in a community that relies on a harmful industry for survival. “In some ways, it’s a love letter to my hometown,” Donovan told Perspectives in an interview.
“There’s a tendency in environmentally concerned photography to look at the impact on humanity as a whole and on the earth, and in Saint John, which is a company town with a monopolized economy, I’m interested in photographing the real people who are impacted by this sort of environmentally harmful industry,” he said.
A photojournalist by trade, Donovan said he trended away from journalism toward art in part because it was difficult to talk about important issues in a succinct way without building close relationships with the people and spending years getting to know them.
Donovan has been recognized by the World Press Photo Awards, Pictures of the Year International, The Alexia Foundation, Sony World Photography Awards, the National Newspaper Awards, and the News Photographers Association of Canada and was named Canadian Photojournalist of the Year for 2017 and 2018. His work has appeared in The New York Times, The Globe and Mail, Maclean’s Magazine, The Washington Post and on ESPN, among other publications. The Cloud Factory, his photos of Saint John, were featured in Canadian Art Magazine and PhotoEd Magazine, as well as being shown at numerous solo and group exhibitions in Canada and the United States.
Donovan values this chance to be a part of the Toronto exhibition, where he will be able to share some of his hometown story with a wider audience.
“Obviously the National Gallery is one of the biggest art stages in Canada and it’s a dream come true to have your work shown there,” he added.
Photo credit: Dainesha Nugent-Palache, Angaer, 2016, inkjet print. The Wedge Collection, Private collections. © Dainesha Nugent-Palache
Headshot by Dainesha Nugent-Palache.
Dainesha Nugent-Palache: Since Toronto-based Nugent-Palache began developing her photography hobby into an art career, she has been trying to articulate her style. From her portraits of African-Caribbean women to her still life photos of Caribbean tradition, her work has elements of acknowledging and representing her community, as well as notions of glamour, beauty and self.
“The still life photos came out of me trying to figure out what I’m interested in, and just trying to focus a little less on identity,” Nugent-Palache told Perspectives. “In doing this exercise, I realized that I'm still speaking about identity even though there are no bodies in the images,” she said.
Nugent-Palache, a graduate of OCAD University’s undergrad program, has been featured in CBC’s COVID residencies series and has participated in numerous exhibitions nationally and internationally. She is a founding member of The Plumb, an ad hoc collective of artists, writers and curators in Toronto. Her artwork is in The Wedge Collection, Scotiabank’s Collection, and some private collections.
She sees winning this award as a way to share her work with an even broader audience. “The National Gallery, I feel like that’s kind of a big deal,” she said.
The winners were selected from a longlist by the 2021 New Generation Photography Award jury, which includes Andrea Kunard, Associate Curator, Photographs, National Gallery of Canada; Noah Friebel, artist and 2020 New Generation Photography Award winner; Lorraine Gilbert, Director, Visual Arts Department, University of Ottawa; and Shelley Niro, artist and a 2017 Scotiabank Photography Award winner.