VLC Prize Announcement

2020-2022 Jane Lombard Prize for Art and Social Justice
Prize recipient and Jane Lombard Fellows

The Vera List Center for Art and Politics is pleased to announce Avni Sethi as recipient of the 2020-2022 Jane Lombard Prize for Art and Social Justice. Sethi is awarded the prize for her project Conflictorium, a museum of conflict in Ahmedabad, Gujarat. 

The 2020-2022 Jane Lombard Fellows, finalists for the prize, are
Jorge González for Escuela de Oficios, a platform for the recuperation of Boricua (Puerto Rican) material culture;
NayanTara Gurung Kakshapati for Nepal Picture Library, a communitarian archive, actively preserving the memory cultures of minority groups and social resistance in Nepal; 
Emeka Okereke for Invisible Borders Trans-African Photographers Organization, an art project investigating colonial legacies, border regimes, and the visual cultures of Africa through collective artistic encounters;
Underground Resistance for Submerge, a twenty-year old techno-music production studio, community center, and record shop in Detroit.

Chaired by Candice Hopkins, the jury included Ivet Curlin, Natasha Ginwala, Carin Kuoni, Tamara Oyola-Santiago, and Shuddhabrata Sengupta. Their decision was unanimous. 

Jury Citation 
“Museums are not normally formed around conflicts, yet Conflictorium is not a normal museum. Initiated and directed by Avni Sethi, a cultural organizer, and trained Kathak dancer, it reflects Sethi’s interdisciplinary, boundary-crossing practice and ethos. Deeply embedded in the surrounding communities of Ahmedabad, Conflictorium is opening up histories of individual and collective trauma and holding space for challenging and difficult conversations. The museum operates within a complicated political context and is an intellectual and ethical sanctuary in the region—particularly at a time when democracy and basic human rights, including religious freedoms, are under attack, in Gujarat, and elsewhere in the world.

Conflictorium is rooted in the political dimensions of its immediate surroundings. Sethi’s commitment to intimacy of scale and sincerity of intent has made it a place of gathering for everyone in the community, from schoolchildren, to elders, to neighbors. Indeed, by working across generations, the museum navigates polarized spaces and challenges historical amnesia. Under Sethi’s guidance, Conflictorium uses lyricism to recalibrate what has been frozen into silence, and it is through this sense of the political dimension of poetics, that it addresses the often unspeakable nature of trauma. 

We are honored to bestow The New School’s 2020-2022 Jane Lombard Prize for Art and Social Justice on Avni Sethi for Conflictorium, and delighted to appoint the 2020-2022 Jane Lombard Fellows. All are recognized for collaborative projects, and we hope that in placing them in conversation, a sense of solidarity will be fostered. The conversations that Conflictorium is engaging with have global resonances, and the projects of the Jane Lombard Fellows affirm this. Hosting Conflictorium in New York in the fall of 2021 will shed light on the current political relationship between India and the United States, one based on mutual complicity, without criticism or reproach.”

About the Jane Lombard Prize for Art and Social Justice

The New School’s Jane Lombard Prize for Art and Social Justice is awarded by the Vera List Center for Art and Politics to an artist or a group of artists in recognition of a particular project’s long-term impact, boldness, and artistic excellence. International in scope, it constitutes a unique meeting of scholars and students, the general public, and globally significant artists. The prize initiative unfolds over a two-year period and provides a multi-layered platform for artists as agents of social and political change. Key features of the prize initiative include the Jane Lombard Prize as well as the Jane Lombard Fellowships, bestowed on the prize finalists.

The inaugural prize was presented in 2012 to Theaster Gates for Dorchester Projects, the second in 2014 to Abounaddara for Emergency Cinema, their weekly films documenting contemporary life in Syria, the third in 2016 to Brazilian artist Maria Thereza Alves for her twenty-year project Seeds of Change, and the fourth to Pan-African collective Chimurenga for their Pan-African Space Station.

The Jane Lombard Prize for Art and Politics is endowed with a gift from Jane Lombard. It was launched in 2008 by Prize Founding Supporters James Keith Brown and Eric Diefenbach, Elizabeth R. Hilpman and Byron Tucker, Jane Lombard, Joshua Mack, and The New School.

About the Vera List Center for Art and Politics

The Vera List Center for Art and Politics is a scholarly research center and a public forum for art, culture, and politics. It was established at The New School in 1992—a time of rousing debates about freedom of speech, identity politics, and society’s investment in the arts. A pioneer in the field, the Center is a nonprofit that serves a critical mission: to foster a vibrant and diverse community of artists, scholars, and policymakers who take creative, intellectual, and political risks to bring about positive change.