NEW YORK, NY.- ArtPrize announced the entry of 1,536 artists representing 51 countries and 42 U.S. states to compete in the 6th edition art competition annually held in Grand Rapids, Michigan form September 24 to October 12, 2014.

The artists’ mixed-media works will be displayed in 174 venues throughout the city’s businesses, parks and institutions (primarily in the downtown area). Artists and venues are independently organized through ‘Connections’ hosted at artprize.org, where these exhibitors match themselves in a collaborative curatorial process via the online platform.

Artists submitted their work under categories of 2-D, 3-D, Time-Based, or Installation to compete for a combined $560,000 in prize money. Venues are also eligible for $20,000 of the purse, to be awarded to a single venue for outstanding curation. The 10 awards for artist entries include eight $20,000 category awards, four decided by public vote, and four decided by an expert jury. The two grand prizes are also split equally, with $200,000 being awarded by public vote, and $200,000 decided by expert jury.

A complete list of participating Artists and Venues can be viewed at: artprize.org/entries

This year’s new Artist Seed Grants presented by the Frey Foundation awarded 25 grants of $2,000 each. A panel of art critics and experts, including Cranbrook Academy of Art and Art Museum director Reed Kroloff and Grand Rapids Art Museum director and CEO Dana Friis-Hansen, reviewed the 214 applications, seeking ambitious and challenging ArtPrize entries from Artists who demonstrated both financial need and artistic merit. The panel selected the following 25 winning artists:

Aaron Nemec, Hey YouTube, It’s Me | Al Wildey, Not a Destination | Alex Podesta, Self-Portrait as Bunnies (The Bathers) | Andrea Myers, Reflex/Reflects | Benjamin Jones, This Land is Your Land | Brian Balderston, Space Drawing #36 | Christopher Capozziello, The Distance Between Us | Crystal Wagner, Bio Interloper | Dana Lynn Harper, Bloom Bloom | Darryl Lauster, God Bless America | Dave Rowe, Art is Hard, Life is Easy | Denis Beaubois, Currency – The Division of Labor | Flint Public Art Project, Sliding Architecture | Gwendolyn Terry, Murmuration | Hubert Dobler, ROUNDABOUT2 | Julie Schenkelberg, Divinity Intrusion | Lisa Mueller-Trede, crossed situation | Maurice Jacobson, We All Live in Gaza | Megan Mosholder, Mijimendan vta Ziibi’ (Remember the River) | Micah Silver, Music | Michael McGillis, Your Back to the Woods | Michael Murphy, Tentatively Untitled | Stephen Dueweke, playCAGE | Steve Lambert, Capitalism Works for Me | Tracy Snelling, The Stranger

Artists Bjorn Sparrman and Joe Girandola were also presented with grants of $5,000 during the Pitch Night events at 21c Museum Hotel in Cincinnati on May 22nd and the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis on June 26th. Each artist was awarded the grant based on their proposals for two of the competition’s most coveted venues, Gillett Bridge and Louis Campau Promenade. For the duration of ArtPrize, Sparrman’s The Grand River Checkpoint Project, on the Gillett Bridge, will mark the border between eastern and western Grand Rapids, forcing pedestrians to undertake the border crossing complete with guardhouse, border control officer and regulatory signs in the conceptual performance piece. Girandola’s Perso/Trovo (Lost/Found) Grand Rapids 1826, pays homage to the area’s historic industry with a Triumphal Arch of fiberglass milkcrates installed at the Louis Campau Promenade, celebrating, as the artist states, “...ingenuity, creation, and trade while memorializing a journey from past traditions into a new space in time.”