Painter Judith Linhares is the recipient of the $25,000 Artist Award for 2017 from the Artists’ Legacy Foundation. The prize, launched ten years ago, is given to a sculptor or painter “who has maintained sustained contributions to their field and where evidence of the hand is a significant factor in making art,” according to the organization’s website. The jurors for this year’s prize were art critic and curator David Pagel; sculptor Linda Fleming; and associate director and chief curator of the Crocker Art Museum, Scott A. Shields. Asked to comment on the significance of the hand in her oeuvre, Linhares said, “The hand is under siege. But the process of drawing is a negotiation between the mind, the eye, and the hand. Drawing is placing something on a two-dimensional surface in relation to something else; it is putting a line in space.”

“Her broad, faux-naïf brushstrokes and juxtaposition of richly hued luxe, calme et volupté with a purposeful sense of awkwardness and unease align her with several younger artists, from Dana Schutz to George Condo,” said critic Michael Wilson in a February 2011 artforum.com Critics’ Pick of Linhares’s show at Edward Thorp Gallery in New York. “Attracting us with a sensual concentration on sex, food, and the great outdoors, and lulling us into a false sense of security via their lush, likable style, these are pictures with surprising bite.”

The artist will use a portion of her unrestricted winnings to archive her vast body of work.