YSP RCA Graduate Award: Michael Forbes

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01 Dec 2020

“It was a welcome surprise to be selected for the YSP RCA Graduate Award as so much else was being cancelled because of COVID-19. The offer of the residency tops two years of having fun at the RCA, which allowed me to develop my artistic practice and move my conversation on from a Post-Colonial narrative to one of contemporary racial politics – using a range of media and new technology. I look forward to spending some time at YSP and working with the staff, as I have been coming to YSP for years and on many occasions thought it would be good to make and show work here at some point in the future. YSP has a great pedigree of artists passing through its grounds and I’m honoured to be a part of its legacy.” Michael Forbes

Yorkshire Sculpture Park is delighted to announce the 2020 recipient of the YSP RCA Graduate Award as #michaelforbes. Established in 2015 the YSP RCA Graduate Award provides vital support at the point of graduation, a critical point in artists’ careers. It comprises a residency at YSP, curatorial and technical support and the opportunity to share practice on site and online.

Michael Forbes is an artist and curator who lives in Nottingham, where he has made an exceptional contribution to the city’s cultural ecology including being a co-founder of Primary artist-led spaces, where he is now Chair of the Board, and being instrumental in the establishment of New Art Exchange. Contemporary racial politics, migration, blackness and whiteness are central to Forbes’ work, in relation to universal debates on wealth, history and religion.

Forbes explores these ideas through sculpture, installations, photography, animation and digital media. For example, an ongoing work that will be evolved at YSP is Gold Christ for Gold #people & Black Christ for Black People. The installation is informed by ongoing issues of poverty and conflict in Africa, which has contributed to the increase of mass migration to other parts of the world, particularly Europe. Unfortunately, the option to get to Europe has caused unprecedented numbers of deaths crossing the Mediterranean. Black visibility, invisibility and the wider impact of religion also inform how the work has developed.

An El Dorado of 512.6 million is an animation exploring migration to Europe and the exploitation of people’s desperation or hopes by #people traffickers. The migrants are lured to Europe by a fake notion of the streets being paved with gold; but the lucky ones that successfully make it to Europe are left to survive in the best way they can, which for some is selling counterfeit designer goods on the streets.

It is anticipated that Forbes will undertake the residency at YSP in early 2021, alongside a presentation of work that will evolve during his time on site, as well as connect to other opportunities through YSP’s international network.

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