Metal sculpture Saima Iita was on Thursday announced winner of the Bank Windhoek Triennial 2020.
Iita also scooped the Three-Dimensional Art category.
Other winners are Ismael Shivute for Two-Dimensional Art, Gideon Megameno Kashile (New Media), Anastacia Karenga (Contemporary Customary Art), Ina Maria Shikongo (Textile Art), Joe Kapena (Best Newcomer), Peter Mwahalukange, Cathy McRoberts (Lifetime Achievement).
Iita received a Bank Windhoek cash prize and international residency, sponsored by the National Art Gallery of Namibia (NAGN) for the financial year 2021/22.
He will take up the residence early in 2022 depending on Covid-19 regulations. All the winners received cash prizes and trophies, and all exhibition participants received a certificate of participation.
A total of 491 submissions were received, of which 233 are from outside Windhoek.
The awards ceremony and exhibition opening were live-streamed on Thursday.
It was Namibia’s first online triennial, with an online exhibition and shop on the NAGN website (www.nagn.org.na).
“It will also be the first Triennial that will be engaging in a global conversation of visual art through virtual platforms and an E-catalogue,” said NAGN’s CEO, Snobia Kaputu was quoted as saying in a statement.
The public is welcome to view this exhibition free of charge until 31 July 2021. All artwork sales are for the artists’ benefit.
The judges were former director of NAGN from 2005 to 2011, Josef Madisia; Developer of the Visual Culture course at the University of Namibia (Unam), Margo Timm Forster; College of the Arts (COTA) lecturer Peter Kewowo; Unam’s Textile and Fashion Studies lecturer Loini Iizyenda, and former Director of Arts in the Ministry of Education, Arts and Culture Ervast Mtota. NAGN’s acting chief curator and researcher Desiree !Nanuses and its associate curator Elize van Huyssteen facilitated the judging process.
All the winners will benefit from a mentorship programme with the NAGN, culminating in a group exhibition for all winners.
They will be tasked with sharing their skills and knowledge as winners through workshops and symposia.