The annual reveal event announcing the winner of the Nasher Sculpture Center‘s prestigious Nasher Prize is always upbeat and somewhat dramatic, and this year’s proved true to form. Once again, the invitation-only gathering at Cindy and Howard Rachofsky‘s Warehouse Dallas art space—held on Tuesday, September 25—attracted a crowd of high-powered art-world types.
Among them were Marnie and Kern Wildenthal, Wendy Strick, Kelli and Allen Questrom, Christopher Wynn, Lynn McBee, Derek Wilson, Max Wells, Christina Geyer, Deedie Rose, Elaine Agather, Nick Even, Donald Fowler, Terri Provencal, Jennifer and John Eagle and Kim and Justin Whitman. The attendees milled about the Rachofsky building’s main room for awhile, catching up with friends while enjoying drinks and hors d’oeuvres.
Then it was time to reveal the fourth annual Nasher Prize Laureate, who will receive a $100,000 prize and be honored at an event at the sculpture center on Saturday, April 6. After something of a false start—the crowd answered his call for attention too quickly, before the presentation was actually ready, Nasher Director Jeremy Strick joked—the formal program got underway.
Taking the podium first were 2019 Nasher Prize Co-Chairs John Dayton and Fanchon and Howard Hallam, who thanked those involved including JPMorgan Chase, the prize’s presenting sponsor, and the Eugene McDermott Foundation and Nancy A. Nasher and David J. Haemisegger, the prize’s founding partners.
With that, Jeremy announced this year’s winner: Germany’s Isa Genzken. A renowned artist whose career spans four decades, Genzken uses a diverse range of media to transform everyday materials into a variety of unique forms. She has a “practice that is continually reinvented and changed,” Jeremy said, positioning her as a major influence on younger artists.
Previous winners of the Nasher Prize, which honors “a living artist who elevates the understanding of sculpture and its possibilities,” were Theaster Gates (2018), Pierre Huyghe (2017) and Doris Salcedo (2016).