Yu-Wen Wu, a Taiwan-born, Boston-based artist, has been named the winner of the inaugural $15,000 Prilla Smith Brackett Award, administered by the Davis Museum Wellesley College. The biennial prize aims to honor outstanding female-identified visual artists based in the Greater Boston area.
“Wu’s artwork tells powerful stories of human migration, of losses and gains, through a trans-medial practice that ranges from drawing, to community-based installation, to video,” Davis Museum Director Lisa Fischman said in a prepared statement. “Projects such as ‘Leavings/Belongings’ are especially important now as immigration continues to be one of today’s most pressing political, social, and economic topics.”
The award can be used for travel, research, project development, or any other expenses related to career advancement. Yu-Wen Wu’s art will also be featured in an online exhibition at the Davis Museum website.
“I’ve felt strongly for a long time of how hard it is for artists—and women artists in particular,” Brackett, who funded the prize, told me in March. “I hope that whoever gets it can use it for anything they think will be beneficial for their career. … Whatever it is that can move them along.”
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