Photo Art at Boutographies Festival, Montpelier

Photo Art are very excited to announce that we have been selected as the course of honour at this year's Boutographies festival in Montpelier, France!

From the press release:

Boutographies, a renowned photography Festival in the south of France, has specially selected the Photographic Art course at Newport to showcase some of its best work over the past four years. Ranging from current students to graduates there will be 14 people representing the course in total. Screened on a showreel in Montpellier this is a fantastic opportunity for the course and its students to gain international recognition. This is another accolade for this high achieving course in photography.

You can view the showreel here and continue reading below for the list of photographers and artists represented as well as a short piece of writing about each piece of work.

The images used at the start of this post are from projects by (in order): Josephine Sowden, Meg Beaumont, Sara Rejaie and Sion Jones.

Stephen Duffy for Reginald Salisbury Award

Current Photo Art 3rd year Stephen Duffy has been awarded £1000 by the Reginald Salisbury Award to complete his project exploring the wealth and status of the Catholic Church:

This work takes a critical view of the wealth and cultural status of the Catholic Church within Ireland. During the 18th Century, while the country was stricken with poverty, the Catholic Church was investing enormous sums of money into constructing altars, in order to use them as stages to evangelize and to propagate.

The money will allow Stephen to continue the project and potentially broaden its scope to include the rest of Europe.

About this year's prize:

The panel selecting this year's Awards had a difficult task and were impressed by the scope and ambition of all the projects submitted for consideration. The panel consisted of Helen Sear and Paul Cabuts. The panel would like to thank Daniel Shires, Graduate Intern, for his help during the selection process.  

The Reginald Salisbury Travel Award is an annual award drawn from a donation by the Salisbury family of Newport to assist students studying Photography at The University of Wales to develop or complete projects that have some element of travel associated to them - either nationally or internationally.  

The award is only open to all year 2 and year 3 students currently studying BA (Hons) Photographic Art, BA (Hons) Documentary Photography and BA (Hons) Photography for Fashion and Advertising at The University of Wales, Newport who plan or currently are making a project with some element of travel associated to it.

Jocelyn Allen in 'Of The Afternoon' Magazine

Photo Art alumni Jocelyn Allen has been featured and interviewed in the second and latest issue of Of The Afternoon. 

It is available for preorder as of today - 25th February - and will be released on February 28th at an accompanying exhibition at the Underground Gallery in London. Check it out!

http://www.oftheafternoon.com/

Diffusion Festival

A date for your calendars! Throughout the merry month of May, Diffusion Festival, an "International Festival of Photography", will be coming to Cardiff. 

It will be chock full of "exhibitions, discussions, screenings, performances, events and celebrations in both physical and virtual spaces and places" and one artist whose work has been confirmed to make an appearance is current Photo Art lecturer Peter Bobby.

Watch this space for more announcements and information as and when it comes, or cut out the middle man and visit their website.

http://www.diffusionfestival.org/

Matt Colquhoun at E Book Show

Maximum Fog, a photo book by third year Photo Art student Matt Colquhoun, has been selected to appear at the E Book Show at the John Hansard Gallery in Southampton.

The show, organised by Brighton-based organisation Photobook Show, will be in Southampton for exactly one month, starting on February 2nd. Their fifth independent show, they have also curated photo book exhibitions at the Margate Photo Festival as well as the Brighton Biennial and Fringe festivals in 2012.

Go check it out!

Jo Sowden for Aesthetica Art Prize

Following on from the recent post about Photo Art graduate Beverley Cornwell being selected for the Aesthetica Art Prize, it has been announced that Jo Sowden - who also graduated from the course in 2012 - is up for the prize as well.

Jo has had many successes since graduating including being selected to appear at the Videoholica festival in Bulgaria, a spot in the Caitlin Guide's top 40 emerging new artists to look out for and her own solo show at Bristol Diving School.

Best of luck to Jo and Bev! The finalists for the Aesthetica Art Prize will be announced later this month.

Beverley Cornwell for Aesthetica Art Prize

Happy new year everyone! Hope you've enjoyed your break! Now it's back to business as usual and we're going to start 2013 with the some more Photo Art alumni successes.

Beverley Cornwell, who graduated from the course in 2012, has been selected for the Aesthetica Art Prize long-list for her 'Empty Enclosure' images, produced during her 2nd year at Newport. This means that Bev's work will be featured in the award publication. The selection of the 8 finalists will take place during January 2013. Fingers crossed and best of luck!

The Aesthetica Art Prize is hosted by Aesthetica Magazine, an internationally recognised art and culture publication. Aesthetica’s editorial combines dynamic content with compelling critical debate, attracting a high-profile, culturally aware audience. Distinguished by its beautiful design and stunning images, the magazine engages with the arts both in the UK, Europe and further a field.

The Aesthetica Art Prize is a celebration of excellence in art from across the world and has developed from the Aesthetica Creative Works Competition. In its new incarnation, the prize offers an even greater opportunity for artists to showcase their work and further their involvement in the international art world.