Belén Uriel, winner of the 6th Audemars Piguet Award for the production of a work of art at ARCOmadrid 2018

The artist Belén Uriel has won the 6th Audemars Piguet Award for the production of a work of art at ARCOmadrid 2018. Her work, En Dandanah, is a project presented by the Lisbon gallery Madragoa, and will be exhibited at the Audemars Piguet section of the Fair, held from 21 to 25 February.

The jury, formed by Paula Achiaga, Deputy Director of El Cultural; Pilar Citoler, collector; Manuel Fontán, Exhibition Director of the Juan March Foundation; Ainhoa Grandes, Chairwoman of the MACBA Foundation; Eduardo Rivero, collector; Winka Angelrath, Exhibition Director of Audemars Piguet; Eloy Martínez de la Pera, art advisor for Audemars Piguet Iberia, and Carlos Urroz, Director of ARCOmadrid, has also emphasised the quality of the projects presented by galleries and artists from around the world.

The artist from Madrid, Belén Uriel, thus becomes the winner of this award, endowed with 15,000 euros that will be employed in the production of the work, her project En Dandanah.

Thus, the artist will produce a monumental sculpture in glass and metal inspired on the glass set Dandanah: The Fairy Palace, designed by the German architect Bruno Taut in 1920. The sculpture will consist of a metal structure that will house the different glass panels with a texture that is similar to broken glass, although it will be one sole piece, in reference to the fragility of the original set and its questionable usability. Through the redesign of the functions of a sophisticated project that was designed to be a toy, but turned out to possess greater conceptual complexity, the artist once again imagines the forms that constitute Bruno Taut’s proposal. The in-depth research and the quality of the construction perfectly illustrates the complexity and precision that are at the core of this proposal.

Belén Uriel (Madrid, Spain, 1974) lives and works between Lisbon and London. Her most recent individual exhibitions include: ‘Topázio', Gabinete, Lisbon, 2017; 'Segunda-feira', Culturgest, Lisbon, 2016; Sand, Paper, Scissors’, Projektraum, Museum, Wiesbaden, 2016; 'Lama no sapato', Parkour, Lisbon, 2014; 'Pedra, papel e tesoura', Museu Pavilhão Branco da Cidade, Lisbon, 2013; 'Useful household objects under 10$', Centro Cultural Montehermoso, Vitoria, 2012. Her most recent collective exhibitions include: ‘Vacío Perfecto', MUSAC, León, 2017; 'Art en Trànsit', Muxart-Espai d'Art i Creació Contemporanis, Martorell, 2016; 'Art en trànsit', Museo de Arte de Cerdanyola, Barcelona, ​​2015; 'Drawing Biennial 2015', Drawing Room, London, 2015. She has been awarded the Programme of Apoio ás Artes Visuais Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, Lisbon, 2015; Arte e Investigación, from the Centro de Arte Contemporáneo Montehermoso, Vitoria, 2011; the 6th Edition of the Grants for Artistic Creations, by MUSAC, León, 2010-11; Grants for Contemporary Creations, Matadero, Madrid, 2010.