IHC Art Awards 2024

The IHC Art Awards provide artists with an intellectual disability the opportunity to have their talent recognised, their voices heard and to sell their work.

2024 Art Award entries open 1 April

Entries open for the 2024 IHC Art Awards at 9am on Monday 1 April. They close at 5pm on Tuesday 30 April 2024.

Please note that we’ve made a few changes to this year’s competition.

The Art Awards exhibition will be at Webb’s Auction House in Wellington (dates to be confirmed). All entries will be exhibited and available for purchase with artists receiving 100% of the sale proceeds. All unsold artworks will be returned to the artist or studio at the end of the exhibition. We’re not selling them on TradeMe this year.

All artworks must either be on canvas or framed. If they’re on paper or cardboard and unframed, they won’t be exhibited or made available for sale and will be returned to the artist.

Also, anyone who is thinking about entering a photo in the competition will have to enter it in the IHC’s Capture the moment photography competition being held later in the year. There will be no photographs in this year’s Art Awards.

The Art Awards online entry form will be available from 1 April.

Full Art Awards terms and conditions

New prize for art studios

We are delighted to announce that The Holdsworth Charitable Trust is sponsoring a new prize for art studios this year. (The definition of studio can be found in the Scholarship Terms and Conditions.)

The other prizes, for first, second, third and the L’affare People’s Choice Award, are unchanged.

Studios can submit up to three artworks by different artists for The Holdsworth Charitable Trust Award. Any one of the three artworks submitted will also be eligible for first, second or third place in the L’affare People’s Choice Award winner.

The prize money is $5,000, and will go to the winning studio and not to the artists. It can be used at the studio’s discretion for materials, equipment or a contribution towards additional tutor salaries. 

Full Scholarship Terms and Conditions

Prizes

$5,000 First Place Winner

$3,000 Second Place Winner

$2,000 Third Place Winner

$1,500 Youth Award Winner

$2,000 L'affare People's Choice Award

$5,000 The Holdsworth Charitable Trust Scholarship Award

IHC Art Awards Ambassador

Dame Denise L’Estrange-Corbet is the co-founder of the highly acclaimed fashion house WORLD which was established in 1989 with Francis Hooper in Auckland.

Her love of the arts saw her first judge the IHC Art Awards in 2009, she then went onto become the IHC Art Awards Ambassador in 2017 and was made Patron of IHC New Zealand in 2022.

Judging panel

Mark Hutchins-Pond

Mark Hutchins-Pond joined Webb’s Wellington, as a Senior Art Specialist in September 2022 after a decade as the lead curator, contemporary art, at the Pātaka Art+Museum in Porirua. Mark’s extensive art sector expertise has been acquired over three decades of studying, writing, presenting, critiquing, and championing the best contemporary fine art in Aotearoa New Zealand. 

Before leading Pātaka’s curatorial team, Mark established and successfully directed his own dealer gallery for nine years in upper Willis Street, Wellington, where he represented several senior artists who continue to achieve record prices in the secondary market to this day.  

He has written for and edited various art publications, both independently and as a part of his lead curator role within the museum sector, and is a popular and respected speaker on New Zealand art and artists. 

Mark has years of experience judging art competitions for Pātaka Art+Museum, Mahara Gallery, Hutt Art Society, and Wellington Sculpture Trust and, after the enjoyable time he had being part of the judging panel for last year’s IHC Art Awards, was pleased to be invited back to help judge the awards again this year.

Elizabeth Caldwell

Elizabeth Caldwell has been working in the culture sector in Aotearoa for more than 30 years and received an ONZM for her services to the arts in the 2022 King’s New Year Honours.

She is currently heading up a new division of Napier City Council as Manager Arts, Culture and Heritage. Prior to taking up the role earlier this year, she was Te Ringa Auaha | Director Art and Heritage at Experience Wellington, with responsibility for the oversight of the conceptual content of the exhibitions at all its sites, including City Gallery Wellington Te Whare Toi and Wellington Museum.

Professional roles prior to this include Director City Gallery Wellington Te Whare Toi, Director at the Dunedin Public Art Gallery, Head of Art at the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, Visual Arts Manager at Creative New Zealand Toi Aotearoa, and Curator of Contemporary Art at the Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū.

Tim Walker

Tim Walker is an Auckland-based arts and culture consultant. After playing leadership roles in the museum sector for three decades – including as senior art curator through the development of Te Papa, and director of The New Dowse – he set up his own company.

As a consultant Tim works with arts, culture and heritage organisations, iwi and hapu, tourism businesses, and government and local government throughout New Zealand.

Tim is chair of Toi Whakaari – the New Zealand Drama School. He has an MA in Art History and was awarded an Honorary Degree in Creative Technologies by the Council of the Wellington Institute of Technology.

Michel Tuffery

The Holdsworth Charitable Trust Award Judge

Michel Tuffery is a New Zealand born artist of Samoan, Rarotongan and Tahitian Ma‘ohi heritage.

A keen historian and active participant in contemporary culture leads to his art being curated into major international exhibitions and programmes, and public and private collections globally.

At the core of his art practice, he ingeniously works across all traditional mediums and multimedia. Renowned as a sculptor, painter, printmaker and for his architectural media artworks, he is a connector of people and places by focusing a fresh lens on community, environmental, cultural and historical divides.

In 2008, Michel was appointed as a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit (MNZM) for services to art, but for him the real reward comes from enriching communities through his art.

2023 Winners

First place

Max Hinds-Brown
The Red Chair

Second place

Courtney Youens
My Dad

Third place

Erena Wylie
Korowai Tui Cloak

Youth Award

Ryko McAvoy-Hope
Farmer

L’affare People’s Choice Award

Manaia Matakatea
Grocery List
See past winners

Our sponsors

Holdsworth charitable trust logo

The Holdsworth Charitable Trust

IHC would like to acknowledge and thank the Holdsworth Charitable Trust for once again generously supporting the IHC Art Awards.
This year we're delighted to acknowledge the Trust's sponsorship of the new Holdsworth Charitable Trust Scholarship Award supporting art studios.
The Trust has been the major sponsor of the IHC Art Awards since 2014 and IHC is extremely proud of the long association between the Holdsworth Charitable Trust and the IHC Art Awards.

L'affare logo

L'affare

Beloved New Zealand coffee business, L’affare, is the generous sponsor of the L’affare People’s Choice Award.
L’affare first became involved with the awards in 2020 when they hosted a special exhibition of top artworks in their flagship roastery and café in Wellington.
IHC is grateful for their support of the IHC Art Awards and of artists with intellectual disabilities.

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