FUTURE.ART.AWARDS

2020 Awards

CELEBRATING THE CREATIVE REIMAGINING

Thank you to all of the talented artists who submitted to our open call for the MOZAIK Future Art Awards. We stand in admiration and celebration of your works, representing a diverse array of lived experiences and creative expressions.

As part of our emergency rapid relief response, MOZAIK invited artists across the country to share an art piece inspired by times of crisis and social upheaval that can shed light on the current global pandemic and help us imagine alternative futures. The inclusive contest was open to all professional and amateur U.S. artists, and entries were submitted over the course of five weeks between April 10th through May 17th, 2020. All mediums were welcome, including visual/media arts, sound arts, performance, and social practice. People of Color, Native people, Queer people, Women, and other historically marginalized or underrepresented people were encouraged to submit their art.

More than 1,100 artists from across the country responded with submissions.

To deepen MOZAIK’s commitment to Flow Funding as a model for diversity, equity, and inclusion in philanthropy, the organization invited its 2019 Flow Funders and Grantees in the arts to serve as judges for a blind review of the submitted works. Winners were announced on May 31st, 2020, with artist honorariums of $2,000 awarded to each of the ten featured artists. Equitable honorariums were also awarded to the judges for their time and expertise.

The Future Art Awards virtual exhibition, showcasing the works of the featured artists as well as the special mention artists, is set to open free to the public on June 30th, 2020. Please stay tuned here for additional updates.

Future. Art. Awards.

Meet The Featured Artists

“Shaded Oppression”

D’nae Harrison, Philadelphia, PA

D’nae Harrison is an award-winning interdisciplinary artist, who is currently focused on creating a public art initiative dedicated to improving the quality of life in distressed and impoverished neighborhoods.

Art Description: Shaded Oppression is a 4ft x 4ft mixed media painting created in response to the 2016 election results. The social commentary piece utilizes oil paint, fabric, and wood to depict a scene of several individuals masked by their government flag.

“Vision Test / Viewfinder”

Jennie E. Park, Santa Clarita, CA

Jennie E. Park is an artist and writer interested in interdisciplinarity, integrated approaches to healing, and structural social change. (In)vulnerability and (in)visibility recur as practices, tools, or obstacles she explores in relation to her work.

Art Description: An optometrist asks, “Lens 1 or 2?” to ascertain visual acuity while flipping through a series of lenses, and viewfinders at scenic stops enable visitors to zoom into or scrutinize vast vistas. This kinetic sculpture references these practices or technologies of ascertaining, manipulating and interrogating vision by presenting alternate interpretations of the same images, via four phrases.

“MMMRRRZZZMMM”

Solomon Robert Nui Enos, Honolulu, HI

Solomon Robert Nui Enos is a Native Hawaiian artist, educator, and visionary who has been making art for more than 30 years. His work touches on ancestry and identity, the nature of consciousness, the human conundrum, and the future of Hawai‘i. 

Art Description: This is a photo of a mural that was created as part of the Pow!Wow! Festival in Honolulu. The title is a Neo-Dadaist expression of the sound of unfolding generations. It is the linked hands and the collectivist visual narrative that best summarizes this strange and potentially hopeful time, even amidst the terrible suffering.

“Hope”

Lesley Thiel, Mooresville, NC

Lesley Thiel is a self taught figurative artist known for her highly detailed photorealistic paintings. Her paintings speak of the strength of the upcoming generation of young women and girls who may well be our saviors. She questions the accepted narrative of the female voice in society and the myths attached to this.

Art Description: A young girl stands alone and isolated in an environment that has been destroyed by fire and which still smolders. On her head she wears a wreath of dead brush: a parody of the wreath of flowers that represents new life and renewal in classical art. Life has been destroyed, but out of it a rich earth is created that will give new life.

“Front Line”

Chuck Styles, Philadelphia, PA

Chuck Styles is a multi disciplinary artist based out of the Philadelphia area and born in a small suburb outside of West Philadelphia. Styles was no stranger to poverty and struggle growing up. In many ways, his artwork reflects both the reality of his childhood struggle and his desire for a better financial future.

Art Description: Inspired by the Battle of Iwo Jima, this artwork depicts our essential workers from top to bottom who risk their lives every day to help keep society functioning. Thank you to all the Delivery People, Individuals that work in Super Markets, Public Transit Workers, Law Enforcement, Doctors & Nursing Staff. You all are holding the world together. On the front lines.

“NOVEL LOVE”

Cameron Miller-DeSart, Los Angeles, CA

Cameron Miller-DeSart is a Los Angeles–based filmmaker (Kidnapped, Lazy Sunday) with a background in acting and a passion for the technical craft of visual storytelling.

Art Description: A narrative short film inspired by the John Hughes love stories, NOVEL LOVE mixes in one additional plot point. A devastating global pandemic. We meet our characters shortly after they’ve met one another and yet, a crackling energy pulses between them. As the film progresses, we get to see a growing love form, despite impossible circumstances forcing them apart.

“In The Crowd”

Francesca Bifulco, Los Angeles, CA

Francesca Bifulco is a native Southern Italian multi-media artist from Paestum, living and working in Los Angeles since 2013. Her practice fluctuates between large-scale backdrop canvases and sculptural wooden compositions.

Art Description: Watch Video

“Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free”

Brian Mark, Brooklyn, NY

NY based composer, pianist and visual artist Brian Mark has been hailed as an “attractive and intelligible” artist (Boston Musical Intelligencer), whose work is “compelling” (London Jazz News), and “preserves the vibrancy and relevance of contemporary art music” (New York Examiner).

Art Description: This is a multi-disciplinary video installation work written for trombone and digital delay processing pedal for Madison, WI based trombonist Cole Bartels and was created as a direct result of COVID-19. The title is a verse taken from Emma Lazarus’s iconic 1883 poem “The New Colossus,” which was a tribute to the symbolism of Lady Liberty.

“E Pluribus Unum (Out of Many, One)”

John Jahni Moore, Huntsville, AL

John “Jahni” Moore is a southern born American visual artist. His early years were spent immersed in books, church, and nature. He works primarily in paint and charcoal but often makes use of assemblage as homage to his southern, indigenous, and African roots. 

Art Description: In this two- dimensional piece, the intense vibrancy of the central colors are brought into a type of suspended animation hanging in the balance of a blue coolness. The piece is backed by mandala-styled configured forearms and hands showing strength in diversity.

“Air Jars (Spring 2020 Product Line)”

Juliana Haliti, Albany, NY

Juliana Haliti is a painter and sculptor who explores her fear and anger towards the profligate human effect on the environment through complex collages and representations of the harmful circumstances surrounding it.

Art Description: Air Jars (Spring 2020 New Product Line), (1 Gallon) Glass, metal, and paper. “Air Jars” juxtaposes the basic hedonistic human instinct to buy pretty, new, and high end products against the dangerous, human caused and human killing infected air that exists in these places where these pandemic viruses originated.

Future. Art. Awards.

Special Mentions

“An era of distrust in the air we breathe”
Adam Ring

“The Ordeal, The Pause”
Ahou Alagha

“The flower that blooms in adversity is the most beautiful, rarest flower of all”
Olena Aliona Korsunska

“Rebellion against death”
Amanda Nwachukwu

“Fight for our future”
Amy Smith

“Floating past the days”
Anna Lin

“Agent Covid”
Anthony Belizaire

“Dawn”
Ariana Trinneer

“Future nyc hot dog stand”
Ben Fine

“I wanna add something to this world”
Brad LeDuc

“The begging bowl”
Bryson Bost

“Deaf”
David Adamo

“Schism”
David Beker

“Multitasking in the times of covid19”
Emmanuel Faure

“The Cure”
Arabia Parkey

“Star tree healing the future”
Gan Golan

“Comfort”
Hailey Marosi

“Lillies and the hare”
Inna Rohr

“Covid Artifacts”
James Gouldthorpe

“New York New York”
Jiannan Wu

“Rite of passage”
Joan Proudman

“Headtrippin”
Lilli Muller

“She who weaves remedies”
Linda Storm

“Myself when I am not real”
Matthew Pagoaga

“Waiting for the last breath / the brutal loss of the beautiful”
Michelle Firment Reid

“Flameout”
Miles Jaffe

“Breath”
Mobina Nouri

“We are not your lab rats”
Monay Woods

“Dear future us: remember these moments”
Nara Lee

“Stay Safe”
Pony Wave

“The Kiss”
Ramin Etemadi Bozorg

“We all kneel”
Raven Dock

“The Last Try”
Reluctant Hobo

“Believe”
Roderick Smith

“The end is the beginning”
Sandra Filippucci

“The Drowned World”
Stephanie Todhunter

“Digital togetherness”
Summer Benton

“Testing, testing, testing”
Tiffany Miller

“Children of the sun”
Tslil Tsemet

“Contaminant”
Vivian Velez

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