Guardian Trust: Apply for Olivia Spencer Bower Art Awards

Guardian Trust Invites Applications for the Olivia Spencer Bower Art Awards for Emerging Artists

One of the most valuable and prestigious forms of sponsorship available to New Zealand artists is now open for applications for its next biannual round of awards. Established in 1987, the Olivia Spencer Bower Foundation has been gifting one painter or sculptor each year with a life-changing opportunity.

Called for every two years by Guardian Trust, this round of applications will produce the award recipients for both 2013 and 2014, which will be announced in September 2012. Each recipient will receive $30,000 in total, paid in monthly instalments, to allow them to pursue their work.

The art awards offer financial assistance to promote artists, more particularly emerging painters and sculptors, with emphasis on future artistic potential. The funding gives the recipient the opportunity to work for one year pursuing their own direction as a painter or sculptor, free from the necessity to seek outside employment.

On behalf of the responsible trustees, Guardian Trust manages the awards process and financial distributions to the selected award recipients. General manager of personal client services Philip Morgan-Rees says the Olivia Spencer Bower art awards set an example for other philanthropists interested in bestowing their legacy through a trust.

“Olivia Spencer Bower herself said she would have benefited from such an awards programme, and therefore set out to establish the trust with specific requirements for people with similar aspirations to hers.”

Olivia Spencer Bower is remembered as a remarkable and much admired artist. Her watercolours of the South Island remain among the nation’s most recognised and revered works of art.

The Olivia Spencer Bower Foundation was created as a reflection of Olivia’s own experiences as a female artist in New Zealand. Unable to dedicate a substantial amount of time to her art, Olivia was keen to assist emerging and promising young artists by giving them the opportunity with total freedom to focus solely on being creative for an entire year.

Olivia Spencer Bower was passionate about art and spent much of her life discovering and promoting works of new artists. She was a member of the pioneering ‘The Group’ for its entirety (1928-1976), promoting artists at a time where there were no dealer galleries in Canterbury. Her passion for fostering creativity and supporting new artists continued when just a few years after the ‘The Group’ disbanded, the first Olivia Spencer Bower art award was presented.

The financial assistance offered by the awards has helped foster the long-term careers of many important New Zealand artists since the first award was presented in 1987. Recent winners have included Robert Hood, Eddie Clemens, Claire Noonan, Cat Auburn, Georgie Hill and Laura Marsh.

Applications will close on 30 June 2012, and the successful applicants will be notified in early September 2012. Applications are reviewed by a selection panel of independent judges.

Application forms are available from www.oliviaspencerbower.org.nz

About Guardian Trust
Guardian Trust has been serving New Zealanders for 130 years and is a market leader in trust and estates and wealth management. As one of New Zealand’s foremost trustee companies, it specialises in asset management and protection, providing wide-ranging advice and expertise in philanthropy, estate planning and administration, financial advice, and personal and corporate trusts.

Guardian Trust is the country’s pre-eminent provider of philanthropic services, administering 462 charitable trusts that provided in excess of $23 million in funding in the last financial year.

Guardian Trust is a wholly-owned subsidiary of The Trust Company, a leading independent Australian trustee.

About Olivia Spencer Bower
Olivia Spencer Bower is a highly-regarded and admired New Zealand artist and through her foundation, she continues to shape the New Zealand art picture.

Known for being totally devoted to her art, Olivia Spencer Bower was never seen without her sketch pad and is remembered as ‘always drawing’. Her skills in watercolours are unsurpassed but she was also very talented in acrylics, portraits and figurative art. Some of her more celebrated works include well-known Canterbury landscapes and as a result she is an outstanding figure in Canterbury.

Olivia was always very involved with and supportive of women artists and it was the lack of opportunities for women artists to devote themselves to their craft that inspired Olivia to create her Foundation. Unable to take time off to dedicate to her art, she was keen to assist emerging and promising young artists by giving them the opportunity to focus solely on being creative for a year. Olivia wanted the recipient to focus on artistic experimentation and growth without having to produce exhibition works or seek employment.

Olivia Spencer Bower was born in St Neots, Huntingdonshire, United Kingdom on 13 April 1905 and died in Christchurch, New Zealand, on 8 July 1982.

ENDS

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