Fauvette Loureiro Memorial Scholarship 2022 winners announced

Established in 1997, the Fauvette Loureiro Memorial Scholarship (FLMS) supports graduates from the Sydney College of the Arts to develop their practice through bursaries funding international travel.

Fassih Keiso, winner of the Established Category, will use the bursary to travel from Syria to Stockholm, retracing a journey he took 37 years ago in search of asylum. It will contribute to a larger body of work mapping the personal grief that emerges from the experience of migration.

Polish-born Elwira Skowronska, winner of the Emerging Category, will use the bursary money awarded to her to pursue a program of professional development, involving residencies at MeLa Lab IUAV, Venice and the UNSW iCinema Research Centre, Sydney, as well as an exhibition at Artereal Gallery and iCinema.

Dr Andrew Lavery, one of this year's FLMS judges and Co-Chair and Co-Director of the Sydney College of the Arts, said the scholarship provided an invaluable experience for both established and emerging artists.

"The Fauvette Scholarship plays a vital role in supporting Australian artists. Over time, the award has helped foster the careers of many highly regarded and talented practitioners."

"I'm delighted to announce the 2022 winners and am thrilled to grant them the opportunity to further their practice overseas," he said.

In 2020, the scholarship was expanded to include two categories (emerging and mid-career/established), in recognition of how such support has the potential to progress an artist's career at various stages of their practice.

Along with Dr Lavery, the judges of this year's scholarship include Megan Monte, inaugural Director of Ngununggula; and Danie Mellor, a multidisciplinary artist whose work explores the intersections of contemporary and historic culture.

Winner: mid-career/established artist ($30,000)

Fassih Keiso was awarded the 2022 Fauvette Loureiro Memorial Scholarship for his works Palmyra; Tug of War, 2015-19 and Personal Narrative, 2022.

His research-based practice evolves from the recurring political nature of Arabic culture, which he stylistically combines with typically contemporary Western artistic trends by using intermedia and/or cross disciplinary methodology.

The work in the exhibition is a reflection on creative methodology and the innate social and political issues that inhabit the everyday life of an Arab artist, coming from a culture dominated by a history of colonialism, war, and violence.

The video work, Palmyra: Tug of War, was completed using footage captured by the artist after two site visits to Palmyra, following the Syrian government's reclamation of the archaeological site from ISIS.

Personal Narrative includes war debris collected by the artist in 2019 from the Syrian sites of conflict that obscure his personal mementos: a love letter written to his girlfriend, who was living in Beirut during his incarceration in Sweden October 1984, and a portrait from his time serving in the Syrian army as a lieutenant from 1986-88.

Winner: emerging category ($10,000)

Elwira Skowronska was awarded the 2022 Fauvette Loreiro Memorial Scholarship for her works Deep Eclipse: Starburst, 2022, Deep Eclipse: Gravity, 2022, Deep Eclipse: Void, 2022 and Eclipse 4, 2022.

Informed by recent philosophical and technological developments, Elwira's practice uses a combination of analogue and digital techniques across a range of media - including assemblages, painting and video - inviting the viewer to reimagine the landscape of the sub-visible as a data-scape of physical and virtual particles.

Mid-Career/Established: Julia Davis & Lisa Jones, Helga Groves, Fassih Keiso, Jess MacNeil, Jelena Telecki, Amanda Williams.

For more than 40 years, SCA has been a leading centre for education and research in the visual arts in the Asia-Pacific region, producing some of Australia's most influential contemporary artists including Jane Campion, Ben Quilty, Rosemary Liang, Shaun Gladwell, Mikala Dwyer and Marc Newson. In 2020, SCA relocated to a state-of-the-art facility at Old Teachers' College at the University of Sydney's main campus, designed by renowned architects ARM.

EXHIBITION DATES: 29 September - 29 October

WHERE: SCA Gallery at the University of Sydney, Camperdown

OPENING HOURS: Monday - Friday, 10am-5pm and Saturdays from 12-4pm.