The Nude Prize

Called The Nude Prize, the tenth edition of the prestigious biennial Premio Furla dedicated to emerging Italian artists was guided by Vanessa Beecroft, the patroness artist who besides masterminding the image for the 2015 award, chaired the international jury that chose the winner – the artist duo Maria Iorio and Raphaël Cuomo – and assigned an honorable mention to the artist Gian Maria Tosatti. The other finalists were Luigi Coppola, Maria Adele Del Vecchio, and Francesco Fonassi.
The 2015 edition also marked an important development as the Award, organized by Fondazione Furla, moved to Milan in partnership and collaboration with a string of high profile institutions – the Municipal Office of Culture and Palazzo Reale, Fondazione Querini Stampalia in Venice, Camera Nazionale della Moda Italiana, Miart and Viafarini in Milan.
Fondazione Furla fully funded the artwork created by the winning duo Maria Iorio and Raphaël Cuomo. Their work will be previewed in Venice at Fondazione Querini Stampalia in May 2015, during the 56th Venice Biennale.
The Nude Prize – conceived by Vanessa Beecroft in collaboration with gallerist Jeffrey Deitch – was also an invitation to reflect on the challenge that artists accept by competing for an award, which implies exposing themselves naked for others to judge. “The nude is one of the classic motifs in art, going back to the ancient world,” said Jeffrey Deitch. “Vanessa Beecroft showed how this traditional motif could be reinvented from a contemporary perspective. The most compelling art simultaneously celebrates and upends the artistic tradition.”