2001/09/14 The Japan Art Association The Japan Art Association proudly announces the recipients of the 13th Praemium Imperiale as follows: Praemium Imperiale Painting: Lee Ufan Sculpture: Marta Pan Architecture: Jean Nouvel Music: Ornette Coleman Theatre/Film: Arthur Miller The artists are recognized and awarded for their achievements, for the impact they have had internationally on the arts, and for their role in enriching the global community. The five recipients each receive 15 million yen (c. $125,000), and a diploma and medal presented by governor of the Japan Art Association Prince Hitachi in an awards ceremony in Tokyo. The awards ceremony will be held on October 25. The Praemium Imperiale is an annual award given by the Japan Art Association for global achievement in the arts. Since its foundation in 1989, it has become a mark of the highest international distinction. The 2001 laureates join a roster of 61 artists, including David Hockney, Willem de Kooning, Robert Rauschenberg, Christo and Jeanne-Claude, Anthony Caro, Frank Gehry, Renzo Piano, Leonard Bernstein, Mstislav Rostropovich, Ravi Shankar, Ingmar Bergman, Akira Kurosawa, Peter Brook. 2001 Praemium Imperiale Laureates Painting: Lee Ufan Japan-based Korean Lee Ufan has been a presence on the international art scene since the early 1970s. Profoundly rooted in philosophy of the East and West, his works offer his response to the basic problems of western art in the latter half of the 20th century. Lee's questioning of artistic methods and materials classes him among a large group of contemporaries; but his elementary forms and reduced processes and colors, his handling of time and space, connect him above all with Minimal Art and Conceptual Art. The genesis of his work is embedded in long meditative phases and profound concentration. Sculpture: Marta Pan Marta Pan has devoted her professional life to a pursuit of geometric simplicity, and to exploration of the themes of equilibrium and continuity. Her site-specific sculptures were pioneering in their attention to the overall landscape, to subtly changing light, and movements of water and wind. They were typically placed in natural environments and sculpture parks, but in recent years are found increasingly in urban settings as her interest shifts to urban scenery, and to the creation of public space environments. She has been very active outside of France, and her encounter with Japan, starting in 1969 with Floating Sculpture for the Hakone Open-Air Museum, was something like a mystical union. She now has about 25 major pieces in Japan that are appreciated for their abstract serenity and harmony with nature that perhaps recalls the essence of the traditional Japanese garden. Architecture: Jean Nouvel Jean Nouvel is recognized for the clarity, elegance that characterizes his work. Nouvel has created a stylistic language separate from that of modernism and post-modernism, and buildings that go beyond cultural constraints. He places great importance on harmonizing a building with its site and surroundings. Another theme unifying all of his projects is the beautiful interplay of transparency, opacity, shadow, and light. Perhaps the most well known example of this is his Institute du Monde Arab in Paris. Nouvel is considered one of the founders of the high-tech school of architecture. He uses materials such as aluminum, glass, stainless steel and concrete, but he adopts a softer, perhaps more poetic approach than his British colleagues. Nouvel's current projects include the new corporate headquarters for Dentsu Corporation at a site overlooking Tokyo Bay. Music: Ornette Coleman Most people think of Ornette Coleman as the revolutionary saxophonist who created "free jazz," but his explorations of the musical possibilities extend much beyond that and reveal a personal musical vocabulary free from prevailing conventions of harmonic, rhythmic, and melodic structures. Coleman's innovations, later to be known as "harmolodics," pointed out a new direction, and also established his place among a group of major 20th Century American composers such as Charlie Parker, Harry Partch, Charles Ives and John Cage. He describes Harmolodics as a system that allows every person to express their own emotions and ideas regardless of their languages, instruments, or role. Theatre/Film: Arthur Miller Arthur Miller has enriched the stage for over five decades. With his Death of a Salesman in 1949, Miller reached a universal audience and set a standard that marked him as a playwright for his time and for all time. The fate of the individual in society, the tragedy of the common man who loses his integrity due to social and economic pressures, the moral and political issues of our time, including the right to speak and think freely - these are the themes that have occupied Miller throughout his career. Arthur Miller continues to be a major force in world theater. The New Praemium Imperiale Website launched on September 14, 2000 http://www.praemiumimperiale.org For further information: www.praemiumimperiale.org The Japan Art Association, Tokyo tel:(81 3) 5251 2245 fax(81 3) 5251 2247 Soyo Graham Stuart, Paris tel: (33 1) 4265 2399 fax: (33 1) 4266 1357 Sandie Barker, London, sba@dial.pipex.com tel: (4420) 7586 4604 fax(4420) 7722 8761 Astrid Lilja, Berlin tel:(49 30) 893 2293 fax: (49 30) 893 2293 Francesca Martinotti, Rome, info@lagenzia.it tel: (39 06) 8069 2424 fax: (39 06) 8066 9906 Lloyd Kaplan, New York tel: (1-212) 575 4545 fax: (1-212)575 0519