For Artists
Artist's Innovation Award
Program Description
In order to foster environments where the innovation and creativity of artists are valued and celebrated, this program rewards Montana artists who have demonstrated:
- Extraordinary innovation in their work and artwork
- Outstanding originality and dedication in their creative pursuits
- A marked capacity for self-direction
How We Define Innovation
Innovation is the act of introducing something new or different to further an artist’s vision and practice. This can mean new methods, applications, perspectives, elements, forms, materials and/or processes that result from study, experimentation or experiences.
Award Cycles
The first round of Artist's Innovation Awards were offered to visual artists at the end of FY 2009. The second group of awards will be offered in FY 2010 to literary and performing artists. Application information will be available online by February 26, 2010.
For reference purposes only, click here for the guidelines for the 2009 Artist's Innovation Awards for Visual Arts.
Six $3,000 awards in visual arts have been granted for FY 2009.
Jerry Iverson, a Big Timber artist, has been recognized for his outstanding artistic innovation as one of six awardees for the 2009 Artist's Innovation Award for Visual Arts. Jerry holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Philosophy from St Olaf College in Minnesota. He uses traditional materials, including sumi ink, layers of very thin paper, and rabbit skin glue to create black and white abstract canvases that are influenced by Asian calligraphy, yet outside the structure of language. The strong black and white images clearly reveal how he responds to the world around him.
His paintings have been exhibited in solo and group exhibitions across the country since 1989, including shows in New York, California, Oregon and Arizona. His work is included in permanent collections at the Yellowstone Art Museum, the Holter Museum of Art, and the Oregon Health Sciences University.
Dave Kirk, a contemporary sculptor from Willow Creek, MT, has been recognized for his outstanding artistic innovation as one of six awardees for the 2009 Artist's Innovation Award for Visual Arts. Dave's artwork incorporates a series of handmade wooden boxes, objects and artifacts that encourage the viewers to touch, explore and participate interactively.
Raised in a family of scientists, he expected to be one himself but instead he began "making things," becoming a self-taught artist along the way. He believes "most artists have a special way of moving through and experiencing the world. a developed aptitude for recognizing, embracing and appreciating" their environment. Dave's studio in Willow Creek is open for anyone in the community who is working on artistic projects, and he represents a trend by modern artists to use art for the good of the community.
Molly Murphy, a contemporary bead and fiber artist from Missoula, has been recognized as one of six awardees for the 2009 Artist's Innovation Award for Visual Arts. . She received a Bachelor of Fine Arts from The University of Montana and her work has been shown at exhibitions across the country and received multiple honors, including Best in Show at the Heard Museum Guild Fair and Market in Phoenix, and Best New Artist of the Year at the 2003 Northern Plains Tribal Arts Show in Sioux Falls.
Molly's beadwork reflects the art making traditions of her Oglala Lakota tribal heritage and at the same time is very contemporary, often using sculptural boxes intricately beaded with images inside and out. She incorporates images that comment on issues relating to women, families, cultural complexities, and even science. In her words, "My beadwork serves as a cultural narrative, an expression of personal experience, and an exploration of form and function. I use the traditional language of color and shape to articulate new observations on politics, history and identity."
Lori Ryker, a Livingston designer, has been recognized for her outstanding artistic innovation as one of six awardees for the 2009 Artist's Innovation Award for Visual Arts. Lori is the principal and founder of Studio Ryker in Livingston, and is also the executive director and founder of the Artemis Institute. She holds a Doctorate of Philosophy and a Bachelor's Degree in Environmental Design from Texas A & M University, and a Master of Architecture Degree from Harvard. Her architectural designs have been widely honored by her contemporaries across the country, and she received the House of the Year award in Organic Style, 2005, (Ryker/Nave Design) and a Merit Award for a Wapiti Valley residence, in Residential Architect, 2007 (Ryker/Nave Design).
In her words, "Architecture should inspire us, not to seclude ourselves from the world, but encourage us to recognize the vast beauty of the world and our relationship to it. I believe that the art of architecture must educate, care for and respect the world through the materials and means in which it is built."
Phoebe Toland, a contemporary painter and sculptor from Helena, has been recognized for her outstanding artistic innovation has been recognized for his outstanding artistic innovation as one of six awardees for the 2009 Artist's Innovation Award for Visual Arts. Phoebe received a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from the Rochester Institute of Technology in New York, and holds a Master of Fine Arts degree in Education from MSU Bozeman.
Her works are modernist "three-dimensional paintings" responding to issues such as urban sprawl and rapid growth in our cities. Phoebe's work has been exhibited and honored nationally, including solo exhibits in Montana, New York, Oregon, Washington and Pennsylvania. Her art is in permanent collections at the Holter Museum of Art, the Yellowstone Art Museum, Paris Gibson Square, and also in private collections across the country. In addition to being a full-time studio artist, she is a collections specialist for the Holter Museum in Helena. In her words, "The imprint by mankind on our planet represents our efforts to create orderly systems that enable us to navigate life. How these systems are structured and the variety of invention is an ongoing theme in my work. The cultural similarities and differences that unite us as a people provide a link to our history and continue to inform and inspire my work."
Lea Zoltowski, a clay artist from Billings, is one of six awardees for the 2009 Artist's Innovation Award for Visual Arts. Ms. Zoltowski has been awarded the Jessie Wilber and Frances Senska Individual Artist Award in Ceramics, established by a private gift to the arts council from Stacy Hamm of Washington and Sage Walden of Oregon. Ms. Zoltowski is the first recipient of this honor.Lea graduated cum laude with a Bachelor of Fine Arts from New York State College of Ceramics in 2001 and is an assistant professor of ceramics at MSU Billings. She has a deep love of teaching, which she does nationally. In 2008 she created claydemo.com as a free educational resource for artists and educators everywhere that currently offers more than 15 ceramics demonstration videos.
In Lea's words, she wants to "challenge the passive spectatorship of art" and her clay sculptures are touchable, fantastical, and encourage a great deal of interaction and reaction on the part of the viewer. Her work has been widely exhibited nationally and internationally, and is in permanent collections in New York, England and China.
