The Press and Journal (Inverness, Highlands, and Islands)
Scots artist nominated for Turner
Prodger’ s work iPhone-based
An artist who uses her iPhone like a “prosthesis” in her work and an academic collective have been shortlisted for this year’s Turner Prize.
The £25,000 art prize is famous for catapulting works such as a huge sculpture of buttocks and an unmade bed into the spotlight.
This year’s shortlist is more overtly political, with the artists all tackling “pressing political and humanitarian issues of today”.
They include Glasgowbased artist Charlotte Prodger’s work includes Bridgit, filmed entirely on her iPhone. Judges said she approaches the iPhone “as a prosthesis or extension of the nervous system ... Body and device become extensions of each other”.
The academic group shortlisted, Forensic Architecture, is known for its “spatial investigations of state and corporate violations worldwide” and also uses mobile phone footage in much of its work.
The group includes architects, film-makers, software developers, investigative journalists, lawyers and scientists. The group uses “innovative methods” to source and visualise evi- dence relating to human rights abuses around the world, investigating “state and corporate violations worldwide”.
Naeem Mohaiemen, 49, whose work encompasses films, installations and essays, is also on the shortlist.
His films, installations and essays investigate a “sense of melancholia for lost political dreams”, memories of Leftist political utopias and “legacies of decolonisation”.
An exhibition of work by the artists will be staged at Tate Britain from September 25 and the winner of the prize will be announced in December.