DARYA RUBO
Earlier today Bertram Hilgen, the Lord Mayor of Kassel in Germany, announced that the artist Hiwa K won his city’s biennial Arnold–Bode-Preis. Named in honor of Documenta’s founder, the prize comes with €10,000 (or about $11,000), and will be awarded at a ceremony at Kasseler Kunstverein, Documenta foundation’s headquarters, on November 3.
This announcement comes following recommendations from Documenta’s board of trustees; the exhibition’s artistic director, Adam Szymcyk; a member of the Bode family; a representative of the University of Kassel; and other esteemed art experts.
Iraqi-born, Berlin-based Hiwa K’s artistic practice is focused on challenging art-world epistemologies. He achieves this through raw interventions that raise questions about art education and the professionalization of its practice, specifically focusing on issues of staging, visibility, and, as per a release, “the myth of the individual artist.” Typically these projects take the form of collaborative dialogues which incorporate narrative forms about history, social injustice, and forms of knowledge dissemination.
Previous winners of this prize have included the Berlin-based artist Thomas Bayrle and Iranian Nairy Baghramian. The quinquennial Documenta 14 takes place in Athens and Kassel next year.