The 2023 Erarta Prize Has Been Awarded

In August 2022, Erarta Museum proudly unveiled its new ambitious project: the Erarta Prize was founded as the first ever contemporary art prize to be awarded through a public vote rather than by a closed board of experts. This premise is consistent with the museum’s core philosophy: art is being created by the artist, but it is the viewers’ perception that makes it truly powerful. According to the Prize Rules and Regulations, the total prize value of 3.2 million rubles was to be divided between artists (2.5 million rubles) and viewers (700,000 rubles).

Following an open call for entries, the museum’s team selected a total of 61 Prize nominees. Their artworks were showcased at the special exhibition organised to determine the winners through a public viewer vote. The 2023 Erarta Prize exhibition featured paintings, drawings, prints, sculptures, installations, photographs, video art, as well as other contemporary art media. Over the span of four months, exhibition visitors voted for their favourite artists. The viewers supporting the artwork of their choice not only took part in awarding the Prize but could also win prize money.

The closing gala event of the 2023 Erarta Prize took place on 8 June. Erarta team members, nominated and shortlisted artists, and of course the viewers assembled at Erarta’s Grand Hall for the announcement of the project’s final results. The 10 winning artists were already determined at the close of the first voting round, while the second round lasted through 8 June. Its outcome finalised the exact distribution of prize money: the final prize amount depended not on the ranking among the 10 winners, but on the exact number of viewer votes received. The 2.5 million rubles of prize money have been distributed among the artists in proportion to the number of viewer votes as follows:

Tamerlane Tles — 30.05%

Elena Grishayeva (Dj Le Nochka) — 29.12 %

Anastasia Kuznetsova-Ruf — 11.43%

Galina Kazarinova — 6.89%

Alexey Apish — 5.22%

DASHA ART — 4.45%

Maria Bogoraz — 3.76%

Rinat Akhmetov — 3.16%

Andrey Shatilov — 3.08%

Dmitry Kawarga — 2.85%

This was a special event both for the winning artists and for those who won various viewer prize challenges of the second round. Out of the entire pool of viewers who voted, created video campaigns, and shared their impressions of the shortlisted artworks, 24 winners were awarded a share of the 300,000 ruble prize money. By actively supporting the artists in the second round, the viewers, too, became prize winners! A little reminder: part of the total viewer prize pool of 700,000 rubles was already distributed among the winners of the first round prize challenges finalised on 10 April.

Erarta Museum would like to thank everyone who took an active part in determining the winners of the 2023 Erarta Prize. Together we could carry through this one-of-a-kind project that perfectly embodies the museum’s core values.

This year, Erarta Prize was awarded the title of Project of the Year in the Arts category by the Delovoy Peterburg daily business newspaper. The high appraisal of the professional community and the enthusiastic feedback from everyone involved proved that Erarta Prize should continue as an annual event. We are looking forward to new exciting discoveries!

Details of the next open call will be announced in September 2023: stay tuned to our website erarta.com and Erarta’s social media for updates.

See you at the 2024 Erarta Prize!