Collection Exhibitions

The City of Hiroshima has selected the winner of the 8th Hiroshima Art Prize, Ms. Yoko Ono (born 1933 in Tokyo, currently lives in New York).

About the Hiroshima Art Prize

Established by the City of Hiroshima in 1989, the Hiroshima Art Prize recognizes the achievements of artists who have contributed to the peace of humanity in the field of contemporary art, and through contemporary art aims to appeal to a wider world and the spread the "Spirit of Hiroshima," which seeks everlasting world peace.This prize is awarded once every three years.

About Yoko Ono
Reasons for awarding the Hiroshima Art Prize
The 8th Hiroshima Art Prize Commemorative Exhibition
The deatails about the Hiroshima Art Prize

Yoko Ono has been active as a creative force for over a half century in various fields as an artist, filmmaker, poet, musician, performance artist and peace activist.
Born in Tokyo in 1933, Ono entered the Philosophy Department of Gakushuin University in 1952. The following year she moved to New York City where she studied music and poetry at Sarah Lawrence College. Soon after, she joined Fluxus, an avant-garde artistic group, where she presented experimental works of art blending forms such as poetry, music, visual arts, film and performance. In 1961, Ono started to exhibit works of art that took the forms of "instructions." These works involved displaying a set of written "instructions," with the objective of inviting the viewers to use their power of imagination and participate actively in the creation of the work of art. In this way, her “instructions” were pioneering works in conceptual art, one of the art trends that emerged from the 1960's. Afterwards, Ono continued to create new forms of artistic expression that used diverse media and were not limited to strict specific genres.
In 2000, a large-scale retrospective exhibition of Ono's work titled Yes Yoko Ono premiered at the Japan Society Gallery in New York City, and was subsequently travelled to numerous venues in North America. It was also presented in Japan with visits to the Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art (Jan. 27 to March 28, 2004), the Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, Art Tower Mito and other venues. Ono has also received international acclaim including the reception of a Golden Lion Award for lifetime achievement from the 53rd Venice Biennale in 2009.

In addition to her activities as an artist, Yoko Ono had been actively involved in pro-peace activities, and after her marriage to John Lennon in 1969, the couple created numerous events supporting world peace and anti-war campaigns. Throughout the 1970's, their messages of peace spread across the globe and became symbolic representations of the international peace movement. Even after the death of John Lennon in 1980, Ono continued to communicate her message of "Love and Peace" such as through the creation of a song memorializing the 50th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima in 1995 and presenting a concert to pray for peace in October of that same year in Miyajima. She also participated in the exhibition entitled After Hiroshima at the Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the atomic bombing, also held in 1995.
Ono has given speeches appealing for the abolition of nuclear weapons and world peace at the United Nations in New York City during review conferences for the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty held in 2005 and this year in response to a request of the Mayors for Peace.
The awarding of the Hiroshima Art Prize to Yoko Ono acknowledges the substantial role her activities have in transmitting the message of the "Spirit of Hiroshima" throughout the entire world.

An awards ceremony is scheduled for July 2011 together with an exhibition commemorating the presentation of the award to Yoko Ono at the Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art.
It is greatly anticipated that this commemorative exhibition will help communicate, from Hiroshima to the world, the messages of Yoko Ono that are rich with the inspiration of the abolition of nuclear weapons and the creation of a world without war, and it is thought that the exhibition will have a great effect on garnering attention to this Hiroshima Art Prize across the globe.

Purpose

This project aims to honor the achievements of artists and extol the possibilities of contemporary art and expression by awarding the Hiroshima Art Prize to the candidate who best expresses the "Spirit of Hiroshima." A subsequent solo exhibition of the winner's work will be held at the Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art, which will increase awareness of both the artist’s work and the mission of the Hiroshima Art Prize and its significance.

Selection criteria

Selection procedures

The artists recommended by the Hiroshima Art Prize Candidates Recommending Committee, consisting of museum directors and art critics from various countries, are presented to the Hiroshima Art Prize Candidates Selecting Committee, made up of Japanese museum directors and art critics, who then choose the prospective winners. Based on the result of this selection, the Hiroshima Art Prize Organizing Committee makes the final selection of the prize winner. The Hiroshima Art Prize is awarded once every three years.

Past recipients

* The 1st: Issey Miyake (fashion/ Awarded in 1989)
* The 2nd: Robert Rauschenberg (fine art/Awarded in 1992)
* The 3rd: Nancy Spero & Leon Golub (fine art/Awarded in 1995)
* The 4th: Krzysztof Wodiczko (fine art/ Awarded in 1998)
* The 5th: Daniel Libeskind (architecture/ Awarded in 2001)
* The 6th: Shirin Neshat (fine art/ Awarded in 2004)
* The 7th: Cai Guo-Qiang (fine art/ Awarded in 2007)