2024 Beautiful Bizarre Art Prize: Yasha Young Projects Sculpture Award Winners Announced!

There is nothing more rewarding than to support young and emerging talent or boost careers. That is what we do here at the Beautiful Bizarre Art Prize and with my Yasha Young Sculpture Award. By supporting the process I can give the select artist the freedom to experiment and truly support the creative process, which has been a passion of mine. Buying art is important but supporting the artists to be able to create is, in my opinion, just as vital.

-Yasha Young, Founder of Yasha Young Projects

Thank you & Acknowledgements

Once again, we would like to thank all of the artists that entered and shared their work and their artistic passion with us. It was such a pleasure to immerse ourselves in the work of so many creatives, working across varied mediums and styles, and reading their stories.

Beautiful Bizarre Magazine’s Editor-in-Chief Danijela Krha Purssey has the pleasure of curating each issue of the magazine and our exhibitions. The Art Prize entries will continue to give her a plethora of new ideas and choices to pursue in future. So thank you again for your interest in the Beautiful Bizarre Art Prize, we very much hope to see how your work has grown and developed in next year’s Prize.

We would also like to sincerely thank the 2024 Jury Panel, particularly the Sculpture Award category Judge Erika Sanada, for giving her time and expertise to the panel. Additionally, we warmly thank the other Category Judges:  Michael Parkes (Traditional Art juror), Kirsty Mitchell (Photography juror) and Karl Ortiz (Digital Art juror), as well as the Directors of Modern Eden Gallery, Kim Larson & Bradley Platz.

To our major sponsors: Tracey Maigne & Keeley Gerard, Owners and Directors of Musonium Gallery; 33PA‘s CEO, Marketing Director & Curator, Didi Menendez; RAYMAR President & Creative Director, Emilie Dietrich; Yasha Young Projects Founder Yasha Young; and the Owner & Art Director of BearWolf Books, Catherine K. Gyllerstrom – our deepest gratitude for supporting this year’s Prize. It is through your support and generosity that the Beautiful Bizarre Art Prize is able to acknowledge and uplift so many incredible artists and photographers from around the world.

As always a huge thanks to the Beautiful Bizarre team for their dedication and hard work on behalf of the prize and winners all-year round.

Our sincere thanks to this year’s Sculpture Award sponsors listed below. It is through their generosity that the Sculpture Award Winners will be able to enrich their practice.

Yasha Young Projects Sculpture Award

The Yasha Young Projects Sculpture Award 1st prize winner will receive:

• $3,000 USD cash, generously donated by Yasha Young Projects, arts philanthropist and Executive Curatorial Director for the FOR_M, a new institution currently being developed in New York city.
• $400 USD worth of services from Stan Winston School, including an all-access 1 year subscription which includes unlimited access to their Course Library by The Masters of FX, with new courses added every month. Plus exclusive access to the Behind-the-Scenes Documentary stream.
• $250 USD worth of supplies of your choice from Sculpey, making polymer oven-bake clays for over 50 years.
• A beautiful, specially commissioned glass art award trophy.
• The opportunity to exhibit in the prestigious Beautiful Bizarre Magazine exhibition at Modern Eden Gallery, in San Francisco, USA, alongside 70+ of the world’s best contemporary representational artists.
• Exposure to a successful commercial gallery’s collector base with the opportunity to sell their work.
• 3 month social media advertising package (Beautiful Bizarre Magazine: 1 million+ followers across all social media platforms).
• Winning artwork printed in the December 2024 issue of Beautiful Bizarre Magazine, as part of the Beautiful Bizarre Art Prize editorial.
• Exclusive in-depth interview published on the Beautiful Bizarre Art Prize and Beautiful Bizarre Magazine websites + shared across Beautiful Bizarre Magazine social media.
• Profile listing [including artwork gallery] on the Beautiful Bizarre Artist Directory for 12 months. The go-to platform for artists, curators and collectors to discover exceptional artists and explore their work.
• A year’s worth of inspiration – a print subscription to Beautiful Bizarre Magazine.

2nd prize winner will receive:

• $1,000 USD cash, generously donated by Yasha Young Projects, arts philanthropist and Executive Curatorial Director for the FOR_M, a new institution currently being developed in New York city.
• $220 USD worth of services from Stan Winston School, including a 3 month subscription including full access to the entire course library. Plus exclusive access to the Behind-the-Scenes Documentary stream.
• The opportunity to exhibit in the prestigious Beautiful Bizarre Magazine exhibition at Modern Eden Gallery, in San Francisco, USA, alongside 70+ of the world’s best contemporary representational artists.
• Exposure to a successful commercial gallery’s collector base with the opportunity to sell their work.
• Exclusive in-depth interview published on the Beautiful Bizarre Art Prize and Beautiful Bizarre Magazine websites + shared across Beautiful Bizarre Magazine social media.
• Profile listing [including artwork gallery] on the Beautiful Bizarre Magazine Artist Directory for 12 months. The go-to platform for artists, curators and collectors to discover exceptional artists and explore their work.
• A year’s worth of inspiration – a print subscription to Beautiful Bizarre Magazine.

3rd prize winner will receive:

• $500 USD cash, generously donated by Yasha Young Projects, arts philanthropist and Executive Curatorial Director for the FOR_M, a new institution currently being developed in New York city.
• $100 USD worth of services from Stan Winston School, including a 1 month subscription including full access to the entire course library. Plus exclusive access to the Behind-the-Scenes Documentary stream.
• The opportunity to exhibit in the prestigious Beautiful Bizarre Magazine exhibition at Modern Eden Gallery, in San Francisco, USA, alongside 70+ of the world’s best contemporary representational artists.
• Exposure to a successful commercial gallery’s collector base with the opportunity to sell their work.
• Exclusive in-depth interview published on the Beautiful Bizarre Art Prize and Beautiful Bizarre Magazine websites + shared across Beautiful Bizarre Magazine social media.
• Profile listing [including artwork gallery] on the Beautiful Bizarre Magazine Artist Directory for 12 months. The go-to platform for artists, curators and collectors to discover exceptional artists and explore their work.
• A year’s worth of inspiration – a print subscription to Beautiful Bizarre Magazine.

The Winners in each Award category and the Musonium Grand Prize Award Winner will be invited to participate in ‘Paracosmic Escape’ exhibition at Modern Eden Gallery in San Francisco, United States later this year, alongside 70+ of the world’s best contemporary representational artists! ‘Paracosmic Escape’ is an international group exhibition Curated by: Beautiful Bizarre Magazine, with Art Direction/Theme Conceptualization by: Musonium Gallery.

‘Paracosmic Escape’ explores themes of retrospection, introspection, and complex relationships with the real world, where internal gateways offer a place of sanctuary to heal from and provide explanation to the effects of reality. ~ Keeley Gerard (Art Director of Musonium Gallery)

Congratulations to the 2024 Beautiful Bizarre Art Prize Yasha Young Projects Sculpture Award Winners: Spencer Hansen, Ornélie & César Orrico!

3rd Prize Winner

Spencer Hansen

Currently resides: United States

“Lela”, Ceramic, Himalayan goat fur, Brass, 80 x 34 x 24 in.

Spencer Hansen graduated from San Francisco Art Institute in 2006. He is an interdisciplinary artist whose imagination and intellect intertwine to create playful art thoughtfully sourced, designed and constructed. Spencer works primarily with natural materials, hand making detailed art that is the antithesis of our disposable culture. Endlessly experimenting with processes and fueled by curiosity, his work flirts with the relationship between light and time, texture, weight and form. The resulting story often reveals a transformation of a common object into abstraction, undeniably familiar, simultaneously foreign. In addition to Spencer Hansen’s Art, which includes painting, sculpture, masks and photography, he is also the co-founder and creative director of BLAMO toys and BLAMO clothing, both conceived in rural Idaho and developed into established independent companies. When he is not experimenting in his Bali workshop, (designed from recycled Javanese boat wood and home for himself and co-workers), he travels between his home state of Idaho, Orcas Island, Japan, California and Europe.

“Lela”: is a Bat Spirit created and photographed by Spencer. Encountering LELA is like discovering a new species with an heir of familiarity, with the power to elicit nostalgia and a sense of belonging, yet an undeniable essence of something unknown. Lela was created for Strangers; a show inviting viewers to contemplate the perception of foreign encounters and wonder at their significance in this world.

2nd Prize Winner

Ornélie

Currently resides: France

“Royal Widow”, Polymer clay, acrylic paint, 27 x 20 x 20 cm.

Since graduating from the GOBELINS school of animation in Paris, Ornélie worked as an animation artist on numerous European feature films. Drawing characters in volume led her quite naturally towards figurative sculpture, which she started to practice as a self-taught artist. At a crossroads between volume and illustration, through portraits of female characters Ornélie develops an atmosphere often surreal and romantic, sometimes dark and strange. She is influenced as much by classical painting, as from comics and illustration, cinema, animation, and literature. By playing on the codes of the cabinet of curiosity, her sculptures reflect her dreams of fantasized eras, as Gothic and Victorian visions. All her artworks are strictly one-of-a-kind, handmade in full polymer clay. Flowers, eyes, fabric, lace and embroideries are modeled with polymer clay, then hand-painted. Ornélie is happy to be at the start of her journey as an explorer of this modern material, which she hopes, combined with her ideas and technical skill, will allow her to explore her creative potential. She will continue to develop her work, playing with containers and floating effects, along with the modeling of fabrics and the render of materials, textures and patterns. She plans to make more ambitious pieces, while keeping the pop and surrealist spirit that she loves : challenging herself is largely the driving force behind her art.

“Royal Widow”: The king is dead. With her mourning dress, the queen wears the appropriate outfit, which contrasts with the color of her thoughts. With the glass dome (and the face) which can be rotated and thus allow the sculpture to be opened, I wanted the effect of surprise more striking and the idea more impactful. The creation of this piece was really the pretext to deepen my work on the modeling and painting of fabric, lace and embroidery, with this unique color for the black dress with a whole range of shades of matte and glossy effects.

1st Prize Winner

César Orrico

Currently resides: Spain

“Bosque”, Bronze, 67 x 40 x 35 cm.

Born in Spain in 1984, César Orrico is a contemporary figurative sculptor. His work proposes a reflection on the syncretic character of contemporary society through the representation of the human form. The reference to different periods and contexts becomes visible in his sculptures, which metaphorically connect time and concepts. César obtained his licentiate degree in Fine Arts from the Complutense University of Madrid in 2007 and supplemented his specialization with postgraduate studies in Art Creation and Research. Over the last few years, his work has been singled out for recognition in world-class competitions. In 2019, he received the Jean Asselbergs Prize from the Taylor Foundation in Paris and won First Prize in Sculpture two years in a row, 2021 and 2022, in the 15th and 16th International ARC Salon, United States. Also in 2022, his work was awarded the Mariano Benlliure Sculpture Medal. In 2023, he received the Reina Sofía Prize for Painting and Sculpture in Madrid. César has participated in outstanding individual and collective exhibitions in cities of America, Europe and Asia, with a particular presence in the United States, France and England. His work has also been shown in contemporary art fairs and salons of recognised standing such as Context Art Miami, Art Wynwood, LA Art Show, Hamptons Fine Art Fair New York, London Art Fair or ST-ART Strasbourg, and his works have been included in public and private collections around the world.

“Bosque“: Reflects on the importance of connecting with the inner essence, a concept that is represented through the meditative attitude of the figure and the introspection reflected in her face. The yearning for spiritual transcendence is perceptible in the weightless nakedness of her body, which appears metaphorically suspended in a world where nature and human being come together to form a perfect symbiosis.