IRMA BOOM WINS THE 2023 AURELIE NEMOURS PRIZE
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Since 2000, the Aurelie Nemours Prize has been awarded to artists “whose work pursues a rigorous plastic quest with a unique spirituality,” as did the work of Aurelie Nemours, a painter and the creator of the prize.
Two prize-winners have been announced for 2023: the graphic artist Irma Boom, who created the visual identity of the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence, and the painter Hans-Jörg Glattfelder. The Aurelie Nemours Prize was given to the winners this Wednesday, 13 September; and as part of the event, an exhibition devoted to recipients’ work is running from 13 to 17 September at the Drawing Lab in Paris.
For the first time since its creation in 2000, the Aurelie Nemours Prize is attributed to an artist working in the field of graphic design.
Irma Boom, born in 1960, is a Dutch graphic designer of international renown who, through her office, Irma Boom Office, founded in 1991, has worked in a wide variety of fields, from posters to signage, from the layout of books to their actual design, from printed paper to moving images: she is particularly recognized in the field of books and catalogues, which she sees as a total work of art in which all the constituent elements interact.
Irma Boom follows the footsteps of the Dutch Constructivist school, which, from the 1920s onwards, was dominated by Theo Van Doesburg, Piet Zwart, Paul Schuitema, Hendrik-Nikolaas Werkman, Willem Sandberg, Walter Nikkels, Jan Van Toorn, Wim Crouwel and Karel Martens.
Irma Boom is notably the graphic designer of the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, for whom she recently designed and produced the entire visual programme for the Vermeer exhibition, from the labels to the posters, from the signage to the catalogue. In France, she is responsible for the graphic identity of the Festival d'Aix-en-Provence, and her posters adorn the corridors of the metro and the flagpoles of Paris every year.
She has received numerous international awards, including the prestigious Gutenberg Prize in 2001.
Many institutions have shown her work, including the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam and the Vatican Library in 2023. Some of her works are in the collections of museums such as the Museum of Modern Art in New York.
Irma Boom’s art, with its rigour, inventiveness and plastic quality, is very much in line with the pictorial work and spirit of Aurelie Nemours.
