The Bellapart Museummanagement and installation model, continues to be unanimously considered as the best institution to know the history of Dominican art, with a vast, selected and organized permanent collection, recently strengthened by an indisputable sculpture room, not forgetting the activities educational sessions and monthly meetings.
It just needed an open national competition. He has already set it up, with the Juan José Bellapart Art Prize 2022successful since that first edition: visitors can’t help but shiver when they walk through the exhibition circuit, in its continuity.
We are used, in our Biennials, to make our selection within the benevolent official selection. Here, and it is a personal criterion, there would be no more than two works that we would ignore! The selection was so rigorous that admission already means a distinction.
The Jury – only one – was composed of Laura Gil, Paula Gomez and Fermin Ceballostwo art historians and an expert artist, who do not allow technical hesitations, however contemporary the work may be.
The regulation, however, fixed the categories participating in Drawing, Painting, Sculpture, also limiting the format. The 3 equal prizes were attributed to “works”, without prior specification. This was the case of two Drawings and a Sculpture, and the verdict was completed with three Honorable Mentions, a Drawing and two Sculptures.
The qualitative richness, both in terms of selection and awarding, first requires a global evaluation, then another text with individual appreciations: It will be our choice.
An exemplary race
Museography and assemblage make use of perimeter walls, panels and pedestals, presentation -including boards- and placement, always have great importance in the Bellapart Museum.
Paintings, drawings, sculptures are distributed, alternating styles, categories, dimensions, so that we stop ahead, in the singularity of the works, beyond the prizes, however justified they are.
According to his receptivity and his criterion, the viewer feels attracted by particular works, and the Audience Award, anonymous and totally free, “will proclaim” this preference, which can choose any supported piece. It seems to us very correct that, since it is a private competition, the categories have been limited to three -fundamental and proven in national and international art-, just as the dimensions are limited… This avoids gigantic works, the level of which is not always corresponds to the spatial occupation. These clauses also favor the patrimonial integration of the “intended” works, and that these stand out in the museum’s permanent collection.
Another positive feature is the award ceremony and presence of the sculptureboth new and traditional, when this is lacking in recent biennials, and therefore denies a weakness – which is presumed to be confirmed! -.
It is clear that the jury praised the flow and dynamism of the Dominican design, participating in the richness of the means used. Here, it functioned as an all-encompassing means of expression, including the concept, another priority, considered both in the admission as in the laurels.
Furthermore, except for non-figurative exceptions, drawing constituted the initial phase of painting with its own value, within the technique and conceptualization. The direct contact of the hand with the tools and the support has been privileged, together with the mind… We feel it equally, made drawing, in sculpture.
The Dominican cultural idiosyncrasy present in most works often included a sense of humor and a poetic edge. This multiple commitment contributes to the excellence of the Juan José Bellapart Art Award 2022. (continued).
