1998 World Print Festival: The Juror’s Experience Part II

By Richard Hellman
(Archived version from March, 1999 - click here for current)

I was in Slovenia from November 5-8, 1998, to finish the jury process. The original jurying was for a large catalog of prints worldwide, all of which would not necessarily be in the exhibitions. It wasn’t quite clear to me before on how this would work. This time we looked at the actual prints and picked what was to remain for the exhibitions and for prizes.

It made a BIG difference actually seeing the prints, as the real scale, color, and surface was revealed. Some prints that looked very good in slides, now looked more ordinary, while some looked better than the slides because nuances could now be seen. Some work was very competent but too obviously derivative of other artists, while other artists’ work, known to some of the jurors, seemed to be the same year after year. The artists were no longer taking risks—-they were working from the same "successful" formula. These works did not receive prizes, nice as they were. The ones that were picked for prizes had something special about them, and in some cases it was very difficult to decide because there were a number of strong, striking works. What was interesting for me to see was (except for mini prints) the large scale of many prints from different parts of the world. Large drypoints, mezzotints, woodcuts, etc. Big is not necessarily better, however, and there were a number of small, yet "monumental" works that demanded attention.