More Road Trip pics

Here are some more pictures from our Friday adventure -- they aren't too roadsy (like I said, I forgot to bring my camera). If you can, please imagine our rest area stop lunch and iPhone maps. At least we did get a few photos from evening's main event:

above: Last year's Grand Prize winner of the West Prize, "Ice Cream Truck Tank," 2006 by the Billy and Stephen Dufala. [we love love love it]

above: Courtney peeks inside and prays that real ice cream trucks
don't also have toilets in them

above: Rob listens as Courtney just can't over that whole Barnes Foundation debacle (meaning: that we didn't get there in time. SAD.)

Comments

[Alex Jones]

Doesn't anyone have anything to say about how the winner was picked on Friday night?
It was a total insult to the other 9 finalists who put their hearts and souls into their pieces. If the selection process is too overwhelming, then just share the price equally. If Paige wanted to pick out of a hat, she should have done so privately instead of publicy insulting the artists. I think the artists should have been told how the winner would have been picked before she asked them to participate. I'll bet some of the artist would have declined. I also think as a gesture of good faith, Paige should publicly apologize for how she treated the artist and should give them the opportunity to purchase these pieces back. These artist put their life into these pieces and to be taken advantage of publicly, just goes to show you that money, family money, does not make a person whole. Being able and having money to purchase art is one thing, but to take advantage and publicly insult these artists who participated, is not about the $10,000 that was given to the 10 finalists. These artist do it for the love of it, not the money. Ask any of the artists, including the artist who won the prize whether they would have preferred a winner be chosen by a panel of judges or by the draw of a hat, and I'm certain that they would chose to not have been insulted like they were. I'm sure that this comment will never get posted but it is something that I felt in my conscious to write.

[Paige]

Alex,

Thanks for your comments and concerns. Another way to look at the process of the grand prize drawing this year is that ALL of the artists were, in fact, worthy of winning the grand prize. It was truly impossible for me to further narrow the field this year and select one grand prize winner. The quality of work in this year's 10 was outstanding. I wrestled with the decision for almost two months and was unable to name just one work that stood out over all of the others. Each and every one of them could have won the grand prize - they were all winners. But the prize was set up so that one artist received the grand prize. Dividing the grand prize equally among the artists was considered, but we felt that it went against the definition and purpose of a grand prize. One artist had to be selected. A random selection took place to exhibit publicly that all of the artists in this year's 10 deserved to win.

I also want to highlight that all of the artists in this years group of ten were winners for having been selected from thousands of applicants. These artists are now part of a growing public collection. We look forward to growing our relationship with these artists and their work, both the work we have collected through the prize and future works we hope to collect.

Please let me know if you have any more questions or concerns either here or by writing to me directly at [email protected].

Paige