The Sámi artist is the latest recipient of The Queen Sonja Print Award, the world’s most important prize for printmaking. Tomas Colbengston was presented with the honour by Her Majesty Queen Sonja of Norway last week in Bodø. It was part of a ceremony that also saw celebrated artist Anselm Kiefer receive the Queen Sonja Lifetime Achievement Award and Swedish artist Maria Kayo Mpoyi get the QSPA Inspirational Award.
The Queen Sonja Print Award is unique in enjoying the patronage of a member of the Royal Family, who is also an acclaimed artist. It is presented every two years to an outstanding, often young, artist who has excelled in the field of printmaking. Artists from all over the world are nominated by a wide range of international professionals, curators, artists and art institutions.
“I am delighted that this year the award has gone to a Sami artist. Tomas Colbengtson’s work is already represented in museum collections and I hope this prize will make his work known even more widely internationally,” Queen Sonja said. For Colbengston, the award is a watershed moment in a long career as one of the world’s most influential Sámi artists, the indigenous people from the northern region of Europe.
Colbengston was born in 1957 in Björkvattnet, a village at the northern reaches of Sweden and in touching distance of the Arctic Circle. His career in art kicked off in 1991 and has dedicated his work to the interrogation of colonialism and its impact on the Sámi pe.
