University of Alberta Alumnus Duane Linklater Recipient of Coveted Sobey Award

Installation View of Duane Linklater's exhibition Learning. 
Courtesy of Susan Hobbs Gallery, Toronto. Photo: Toni Hafkenscheid.

On October 9th North Bay Ontario resident and University of Alberta Alumnus Duane Linklater was announced at the 2013 recipient of the Sobey Art Award, joining an elite dozen Canadian artists who have received the award since its inception in 2002. Duane graduated from the University of Alberta in 2003 with a BA in Native Studies and a minor in Art & Design, where he studied under the tutelage of Painting Professor Allen Ball:

"I was thrilled to learn of Duane's success as the recipient of the $50,000 2013 Sobey Art Award. One of the pleasures of my involvement with the department is to see our students receive recognition for their talent outside of the creative community here in the Department of Art and Design at the University of Alberta." (Allen Ball, Professor of Painting)."

Linklater was selected from a shortlist of Canadian artists hailing from throughout the provinces and presented with the 2013 Sobey Award by 2012 recipient Raphaëlle de Groot. 2013's Sobey Award was judged by a panel of five curators who converged on Halifax's Art Gallery of Nova Scotia for the gala event hosted by Marc Mayer, Director of the National Gallery of Canada. In reference to Duane's success, the Curatorial Panel spoke especially of the inherent value of Linklater's practice with respect to national and international contemporary art:

"Linklater actively investigates the authority of language and pushes its boundaries. His practice simultaneously engages with wild, rural, urban, and digital realms."

Duane Linklater is Omaskêko Cree, from Moose Cree First Nation in Northern Ontario. His multidisciplinary practice, throughout which can be found a concern with, and investigation of, First Nation identity, features installation, film, video, sculpture and performance (often incorporating collaborative gestures). Linklater's work has featured at multiple exhibition spaces both nationally and internationally, most recently at Toronto's Susan Hobbs Gallery this past summer.

Duane Linklater's success follows the recent news that BFA candidate Morgan Melenka has been named the recipient of the Golden Jubilee Scholarship in the Visual Arts following after being elected the most eligible candidate by the Alberta Foundation for the Arts for her work.

"In painting I work very large and on non-traditional materials, and in the past I depended on frugality and wile to concoct large surfaces on which to paint. I'm excited for the freedom this award will give me to expand my way of working, and already this term I have begun working with new surfaces in my practice. I am extremely grateful to the jury at the Alberta Foundation of the Arts as I have a great many plans that, now in my final year of my BFA, I can realize more fully" (Morgan Melenka).

Morgan Melenka, Happy Couple (2013).