The Signature Art Prize 2018 Judging Panel

The Signature Art Prize 2018 sees both a fantastic judging panel, along with some incredible prizes.

Artists will be battling it out in the disciplines of Painting, Drawing & Printmaking, Photography & Film, and Sculpture. We are fortunate enough to have a panel whose expertise span the art industry, each able to use their own area of knowledge to offer a unique insight into what they believe makes a piece of artwork stand out above others.

Our judges will come together after the competition closes to select 5 finalists from each category, whom they believe display the most skill and promise, and effectively displayed their signature style and practise through one submission alone.

This years judges:

JOYCE WILSON | LONDON AREA DIRECTOR | ARTS COUNCIL ENGLAND​​​​

DAYNA LEE & TED BERNER | FOUNDERS & PRINCIPLE DESIGNERS | POWERSTRIP STUDIOS

Dayna Lee and Ted Berner are founders and principal designers of Powerstrip Studio. Graduates of Rhode Island School of Design with Fine Arts degrees, both are international award-winning designers. With their background in motion picture industry art direction, Dayna and Ted have established a reputation for their cinematic approach to design. After college, Dayna and Ted worked in media, fashion and the film industry providing concept design and graphic design for photographer Helmut Newton, illustration for designer Ralph Lauren, and editorial New York Times. Lee and Berner have each received Emmy Award nominations for Outstanding Art Direction for “Sting, All this Time.” Their careers include work for films by Ridley Scott, Paul T Anderson, Jim Jarmusch and Kevin Costner. All experiences led to the creation of Powerstrip Studio, an LA based multidisciplinary design studio of interior designers and architects specializing in conceptual design and execution of public and private environments. With diverse international projects in urban, resort, and mountain locations, Powerstrip Studio was awarded 2017 Best Hotel Design in Europe under 200 Keys) International Hotel and Properties / Design et Al, for their design of Hotel Zoo in Berlin and 2018 Best Suites Design in North Americas & Caribbean International Hotel and Properties / Design et Al, for their design of Seafire Resort & Spa. Current projects are culturally diverse and in East Berlin, London in Southbank and Westminster, the Teton Mountains of Jackson Hole, the island of Grand Cayman, glass skyscraper in Indonesia and historic guesthouses in Key West.

ZOE LAUGHLIN | CO-FOUNDER & DIRECTOR OF THE INSTITUTE OF MAKING AND THE MATERIALS LIBRARY PORJECT

Zoe Laughlin is a co-founder/director of the Institute of Making and the Materials Library project. She holds an MA from Central Saint Martin's College of Art and Design and obtained a PhD in Materials within the Division of Engineering, King's College London. Working at the interface of the science, art, craft and design of materials, her work ranges from formal experiments with matter, to materials consultancy and large-scale public exhibitions and events with partners including Tate Modern, the Hayward Gallery, the V&A and the Wellcome Collection. Her particular areas of interest are currently The Sound of Materials, The Taste of Materials and The Performativity of Matter, with outputs ranging from theatrical demonstration lectures to the making of instruments and features on both radio and television.​​

MILO DICKINSON | ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR | CHRISTIES

Milo Dickinson joined Christie’s in the European Sculpture department in January 2012. Since then he has been involved in several notable sales, including the sale of a bronze Mannerist masterpiece by Adriaen de Vries for $28 million to the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, which now holds the world record price for an early European sculpture at auction. Milo ran the highly successful Collection of a Distinguished Swiss Gentleman and contributed to several important collection sales including Living with Art, the collection of Professor Sir Albert Richardson, the Abbott Guggenheim collection of Renaissance bronzes, as well as the extraordinary exhibition of works from the collection of Hubert de Givenchy in Paris.​

KATE JONES | BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT DIRECTOR | JOHN JONES​​​​

LEE MADGWICK RBA | SPECIALIST: PAINTING

Norfolk-born artist Lee Madgwick was born in 1980, he studied Graphic Design at the Norwich University College of the Arts, graduating in 2003. With an undercurrent of mischievous menace throughout, the subject matter is at once thrown into question, creating a narrative - albeit a subjective one.

Lee paints on canvas in oils and acrylics - a play of light is used to generate an abundance of seemingly inexplicable moods to contrast with a brooding sky. Lee has exhibited widely in UK galleries and in art fairs in London, New York, Amsterdam, Singapore and Milan. In 2009 he won Best in Show at the Eastern Open Exhibition, Kings Lynn Arts Centre, where he was also a winner of the Wyss Foundation Painting Award in 2013. He has also been selected for The Royal Academy Summer Exhibition in 2009 and 2012 a

nd more recently was elected a member of the Royal Society of British Artists (RBA) where he won the Woodhay Gallery Award in 2010.