UK &
International
Emerging Artist
Awards
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VAO JUDGES
The VAO appoints members from the contemporary art world to join our expert panel to judge our artist's applications. These members can be artists, writers, art critics, professors, collectors and curators. If you would like to become a VAO judge for our Art Awards then please contact us here.
Megan Wright
Senior Curator at Saatchi Art. She graduated with a B.S. in Business Administration (minor in Cinematic Arts) from The University of Southern California and also attended UCLA as part of their CIDA-accredited program in Architecture and Interior Design. Megan has over a decade of experience in sales and management. She was a founding partner of The Commons Showroom, a contemporary apparel showroom, and has also worked in entertainment and design for companies including CAA, 3 Arts Entertainment, and Waterworks. Megan is motivated by exceptional design and working with collectors to select artwork that elevates their spaces and defines their passions. Favorite artists include Andy Goldsworthy, James Casebere, Pat Steir and Njideka Akunyili Crosby.
Ryan Stanier
Ryan Stanier is an art fair entrepreneur who started The Other Art Fair in 2011. Since then the fair has worked with over 3,000 artists from across 20 countries. The fairs are now established in London, New York, LA, Sydney, Melbourne, Dallas and Chicago. Since its launch, the fair has attracted over 250,00 art-loving visitors selling more than 25,000 artworks from emerging artists.
Carne Griffith
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Carne Griffith is renown for his intricate art incorporating calligraphy inks, graphite and liquids. Carne’s illustration work has seen him collaborate with the British photographer Rankin for a 6-page feature in Hunger magazine as well as featuring in publications worldwide, notably for several covers of the New York Observer and English Heritage magazine. Carne’s work has been used in brand and charity projects including Microsoft, M&S, Peroni, Lakes Distillery and Ibis Hotels. Since establishing his own studio in 2010, Carne has exhibited in the UK and overseas with work shown at the London Original Print Fair, the Royal Academy, Stroke Art Fair, Affordable Art Fair, the London Art Fair and with solo Exhibitions in Brighton, Hong Kong, Milan and Hamburg.
Jessica Svenningson
With an extensive background in material culture, museology and now VR/AR game development, Jessica has had an eclectic career in both artistic and technical businesses. With previous experience as a Creative Coordinator for NFT marketplace DoinGud and Lead Art + Tech Business Developer for Research Casting International, she is now the Head of Digital for the estate of Canadian indigenous artist Norval Morrisseau. Jessica believes the thoughtful application of technology can activate and engage audiences in innovative ways, deepening our appreciation of abstract data through algorithmic applications for enhanced visual interpretation to transform our collective perception of reality.
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Rosalind Davis
Rosalind Davis is an artist whose central investigation is the transformation and reconfiguration of space through multiple disciplines. Beginning with architecture, Davis dis-assembles its geometries to create multifaceted spaces. In both 2&3d work, thresholds allude to the boundaries between spaces; interior and exterior space, the physical and psychological. Davis modular site-specific installations are re-assembled and respond according to the particular architectural conditions of the site created using steel frames, transparent and luminous perspex sheets and thread
“ ‘This Unfolds is a transformative piece which looks to fold, shift, disassemble, lean and reconfigure itself with endless possibilities. Rosalind relates this to her paintings as if she's 'taken the structure and pulled it out and turned it into a sculpture'. Jillian Knipe, Wall Street International
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The thread in her work dissects boundaries and creates shattered geometric planes, the imagery being literally pinned down, or threaded together - traditionally thread is associated with the domestic activity of making, repair and creation but also used to consciously interrupt as well the hard-edged aesthetics of modernist architecture, geometric abstraction and design.
Whilst still working independently Davis has collaborated on a number of installations with Justin Hibbs that bring together different aspects of their respective practices to create, disorienting and experiential environments and exhibited at The Foundry Gallery, Thorp Stavri, no format Gallery and Koppel Projects.
Dr Jeremy Turner
Jeremy is Deputy Head of Art & Design and Programme Leader in Fine Art at the University of Chester. He holds a BA (Hons) in Fine Art from Manchester Polytechnic, an MA Fine Art from Bretton Hall College and a PhD in sculpture by practice from the University of Leeds. Jeremy is a sculptor and Fine Art practitioner who has exhibited widely in the UK and Europe. He is a member of the Royal Society of Sculptors and has sculptural works held in private collections.
Isabel Couceiro da Costa Newman
Isabel Couceiro da Costa Newman (born 2002) is a Portuguese-American figurative oil painter based in Boston, MA. Currently studying for a Bachelor of Fine Arts at Boston University, she began her artistic journey in 2017 at the Chicago Academy for the Arts. Isabel focuses on refining both traditional and contemporary figurative painting styles. In 2023, Isabel won the Overall Winner title at the Visual Art Open UK & International Awards. She also collaborated with Warner Music Group on an album cover for Trippie Redd. Her works have been exhibited in the US, South Korea, and London.
Karen Turner
Karen Turner is an award-winning figure and portrait artist whose oil paintings are a commentary on the weight of expectations. Focusing on the physical body and the scrutiny to which it is commonly subjected, her paintings explore what society expects of a woman, the ways in which a woman’s shape is often considered to define her, and the impact that this has on her life and sense of self.
Karen was the winner of the VAA Professional Artist Award in 2022 and is currently one of ten finalists for The Dubel Emerging Artist of the Year Prize. She was awarded the President’s Prize by the Institute of East Anglian Artists and has been a finalist in the Beautiful Bizarre Art Prize, the Holly Bush Emerging Woman Painter Prize and the Theo Paphitis Art Prize. She exhibits with The Other Art Fair and has recently held her first solo show in London with Red Eight Gallery.
@karen_turner_artist
Emily-Jean Alexander
Emily-Jean Alexander is an experienced & certified Project Management Professional (PMP) working in the Canadian and International arts & cultural sectors both professionally and through volunteer service for over 10 years. With extensive experience in producing art events, Emily-Jean helped with the direction, management, and production of 3 editions of The Other Art Fair Chicago, 5 editions of The Other Art Fair Brooklyn, 8 editions of Art Toronto and 6 editions of Artist Project. Through contract positions in the cultural sector she has worked with municipal cultural services as well as also with local non-profit art organizations managing strategic projects.
photo credit: Sarah Sabo Photography.
Instagram: @artfairemily
Stephen Snoddy
Stephen Snoddy is the Director of The New Art Gallery, Walsall; Honorary Member Royal Ulster Academy; Visiting Professor Manchester School of Art 2019 – 22. Snoddy has decades of industry experience in art galleries and exhibitions, having been the Exhibitions Organiser at Arnolfini Gallery, the Exhibitions Director of Cornerhouse, Manchester, the director of the construction of the Milton Keynes Gallery, and several other directorial projects. He took up painting again in 2013 and has had his work shown in public art collections around the globe.
@snoddy.stephen