First Prize, JP Powel
Hunting the Field Mushroom

“From a distance, this is a landscape painting—with a focus on the feathered edges of creamy, sunlit clouds underlined by silhouetted trees that make a dark lacework of detail with negative space. But, closer up, there’s a lot more happening: someone is hidden in the shadows at the tree line, bending down to, as the title explains, pick a mushroom.  This focus on the sky, with careful details and storylines below, is right out of Renaissance landscape painting. It is both a landscape painting and a narrative painting, a conceptual loop repeated by the formal, triangular loop that the viewer’s eye makes from sunlit cloud to mushroom picker to cow and back to sunlit cloud. The painting is full of movement, detail, and perfected atmosphere. Well done!” —Ben Shattuck

Second Prize, Lindsey Epstein
Atlantic Storm Blue Crystalline Vase

“There are many reasons an artwork can draw you in, can make you stop in your tracks and spend time looking. Sometimes by its uncomplicated beauty—as in a large Monet landscape. Sometimes by the sheer talent obvious in its making—as in a Dutch Still Life, where every droplet of water is painted on the dying leaves of a bouquet. Sometimes by scale or majesty—as in coming upon a Richard Serra work, when you stand beside giant unrolled sheets of metal. Sometimes by the work’s mystery, where you can’t quite figure out how the artist did what he or she did—as in a James Turrell work that flattens space into a two-dimensional color field. And sometimes, as in Lindsey Epstein’s work, the work arrests the viewer with a combination of a few things: the how-the-heck-did-she-do-it mystery combined with recognizable skill in its making. These crystalline blooms are astounding because they are not easy to figure out, and their organic—lichen-like—forms spread across a flawlessly made vase. I could look at this for hours!” —Ben Shattuck

Honorable Mention, Vidar Haaland
Island Retreat

“Watercolor is a famously difficult medium. You can’t really make any mistakes, because every brush stroke stains the paper, and there’s no scraping it away like oil or acrylic! To make a really good watercolor painting, you have to figure out the whole thing in your head before you even begin. Vidar Haaland’s Island Retreat is a fantastic watercolor—both in the handling of the paint and the extraordinary composition, which leads the viewer’s eye from the solid and shadowy foreground right up along the dock and to—as the title reads—the Island. This is a delicate work, showing a mastery of painting and perspective.” —Ben Shattuck

About the Juror: Ben Shattuck is the lead curator of the Dedee Shattuck Gallery. He is a graduate of Cornell University and the Iowa Writers' Workshop. His paintings have been exhibited at the New Bedford Art Museum, Sloane Merrill Gallery, Greylock Gallery, Steven Amedee Gallery, and Julie Heller Gallery. He is also the founder and director of the Cuttyhunk Island Writers' Residency. Shattuck has received fellowships from the US National Parks Service Artist-in-Residence program, The Vermont Studio Center, Bush Creek Center for the Arts, The Arts Students’ League of New York, and the Lighthouse Works.