Hasta La Ideas

Courtesy 303 Gallery and the artist

Last night, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation and Hugo Boss announced that German artist Hans-Peter Feldmann is the winner of the 2010 Hugo Boss Prize. He will receive $100,000 (plus a a terrific tetrahedral trophy), and an exhibition of his work will be on view at the Guggenheim Museum from May 20 through September 5 of next year. Other artists shortlisted for this, the eighth Hugo Boss Prize were Cao Fei, Roman Ondák, Walid Raad, Natascha Sadr Haghighian, and Apichatpong Weerasethakul. Established in 1996, the biennial award “is conferred upon artists whose work represents a significant development in contemporary art,” according to Hugo Boss and the Guggenheim. Past winners include Emily Jacir, Matthew Barney, Pierre Huyghe, and Tacita Dean.

Based in Dusseldorf, Feldmann has a way with the quotidian: reframing found images and familiar objects in an arresting way, and often presenting them in intriguing serial formats. We once clipped a photo of his haunting Man Ray-meets-Magritte work “The Lovers” (2008) and repurposed it as a twisted valentine. (We had a feeling Feldmann would have approved.) “His obsessive accumulation of objects and images amounts to a tremendous ongoing project of cataloguing the multiplicity of potential meanings present in the world around us,” noted the international jury of museum directors and curators in its statement. “Although he has been practicing for over four decades and has been a key influence on generations of younger artists, Feldmann’s work exhibits a vitality and keen originality that places it among the most compelling work being produced today. It is this critical engagement with the moment that we recognize in awarding him the Hugo Boss Prize 2010.”

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