Studio Arts instructor receives Hnatyshyn Foundation Award

Nicole Gingras, a part-time Fine Arts faculty member, has received the 2012 Hnatyshyn Foundation Award for Curatorial Excellence in Contemporary Art.

The $15,000, mid-career award recognizes the role Gingras, BFA 86, has played at both the national and international levels in promoting awareness and understanding of experimental practices in photography, film, video and sound art. She has worked independently and with galleries, museums, artist-run centres and festivals as a curator, writer, programmer and filmmaker. She was recently appointed general and artistic director of La Biennale de Montreal, which will take place in 2013.

"Nicole Gingras' active engagement with new art, her energy, and her intellectual rigour have enabled her to sustain a practice devoted mainly to new and relatively unexplored areas of contemporary art," the jury noted. "As an independent curator, her practice is subject to many of the same risks and uncertainties as those of the artists she works with, while it demonstrates a versatility that has allowed her to use this fluid institutional context to great advantage."

The award will be presented at a public gala on November 19 at the Musée des beaux-arts.