Snapshot 15: Mapping Participation

PRESS RELEASE:

--

Snapshot Presents Snapshot 15: Mapping Participation: People and Place in the John Moores Painting Prize

Snapshot 15 offers a new perspective on the histories of the John Moores Painting Prize (JMPP). Presenting findings from collaborative research with Big Data from the first four decades of the John Moores Painting Prize, this Snapshot was led by JMPP embedded post-holder, Dr Hana Leaper.

The Snapshot explores how data can uncover patterns that are difficult to see when we approach exhibition histories through individual artists and artworks alone. Bringing together research into regional exhibition histories with newly created data visualisations, it asks who participated in the JMPP, where artists resided, and where their practice was based.

By using data from the 1957, 1967, 1976, and 1989 JMPP, each vitrine introduces distinct datasets that present our key research findings into regional exhibition histories. Gender demographics of participating artists are represented through picturing the disparity between genders. Mapping artists’ places of residence and exploring their places of origin across four decades with infographics, highlights how data disrupts ideas about relationships between the capital and the provinces.

Examining these different datasets side by side reveals shifting demographics and enunciates geographical patterns across four decades of the Prize. Snapshot 15 shows how data-led research can broaden art-historical enquiry, generating new questions about participation, place, networks, and the construction of exhibition histories.

--