Inaugural President’s Art Prize encourages interdisciplinary art, networking

Entries for the inaugural President’s Art Prize closed Jan. 25, and this year, the competition welcomed students of all majors as well as recent alumni. A jury of three entrepreneurs and artists will allocate $2,000 dollars in cash prizes and award applicants the opportunity to display their work in Colorado State University President Amy Parson’s Magnolia House.

Student curators Maximus Vogt and Anna Coons have played a key role in getting the message out to CSU students and recent alums.

Vogt, the curatorial and exhibitions assistant for the art and art history department and student curator for the competition, noted the benefits that winning a competition like this could have for budding artists.

“The president’s house is something that is, like, instantly recognizable as this place of prestige for artists, for student artists especially,” Vogt said. “I don’t think there’s been an opportunity like this at CSU. We have a lot of opportunities for students to display art in galleries, but to be able to display your work in a residence is really interesting.”

Vogt and Coons have spent time raising awareness of the competition, organizing details and coordinating efforts between the College of Liberal Arts Dean’s Office and the department of art and art history.

“The work we do with outreach to the community matters,” Coons said. “It involves knowing artists. You go to events, you look at artwork and you think, ‘That’s great. I like that kind of artwork. This would be good in this exhibition.’”

The excitement for this project extends universitywide, and it has a historic nature of interdisciplinary opportunity.

“From the get-go, we really believed that artistic talent is not contained by majors and that we needed to connect with students in engineering and in economics, in literature and in history,” said Xinran Yuan, the director of exhibitions and community engagement within the department of art and art history.

Even Parsons has pitched in to spread the word, creating promotional videos, offering up space in the Magnolia House and promoting fine arts at the university.

“One of the most exciting things is the tremendous enthusiasm and support that I’ve witnessed on President Parsons’ side,” Yuan said.

This year, the majority of applications for the prize came from CSU art students. In future years, Yuan said she hopes that this competition will serve as a bonding agent between the larger Fort Collins art community and the community at CSU. The competition was even opened to recent graduates of the university.
“They’re salt of the earth people. Everything here is earned. I’ve always been impressed with the level of commitment and time that students are willing to give to their practice, especially at CSU. They’re willing to put in the time to make the thing that’s good. I feel very much like there’s an incredible amount of strength in the creativity at the university.” -Martha McGee, CSU alumna and President’s Art Prize juror
A major benefit to the competition is the networking opportunities it provides art students. In the upcoming months, the Magnolia House will host an event to honor the winners of the prize.

“The president’s house as a space to show art is really fascinating in and of itself because it’s a space that not only is the art community at CSU going into, but there’s also the athletics community and … all different kinds of people and events there,” Vogt said.

Two of three jurors on the board call CSU their alma mater and have deep ties to the art community in Northern Colorado. One of these jurors and a CSU alumna is Martha McGee, the cofounder and CEO of NINE dot Arts. McGee’s schedule is packed with meetings, press and business-related events, but she expressed particular excitement for this project.

“I get requests to do a lot of juries, but I felt like this one was really important,” McGee said.

McGee and the other jurors, Jasmine Holmes and Christian Gaines, demonstrate involvement, expertise and contribution to the art community, and McGee offers additional insight into the artistic culture at CSU.

“They’re salt of the earth people,” McGee said. “Everything here is earned. I’ve always been impressed with the level of commitment and time that students are willing to give to their practice, especially at CSU. They’re willing to put in the time to make the thing that’s good. I feel very much like there’s an incredible amount of strength in the creativity at the university.”

Although the jurors have not yet begun work for the project, they will soon serve both as decision-makers and a support system for students who receive recognition for their work.

“They will have one-on-one meetings, during which the jury mentor will provide more bespoke feedback on the artist’s work and offer advice on career trajectories and, in the future, hopefully connect and continue to stay in touch to connect them to appropriate opportunities,” Yuan said.

With the competition freshly closed, $2,000 dollars on the line and a wide range of networking opportunities available, the President’s Art Prize at CSU presents a unique opportunity for interdisciplinary art students to show Parsons and the larger Fort Collins community just how powerful art can be.

Reach Ella Dorpinghaus at entertainment@collegian.com or on social media @RMCollegian.