UVic Student Wins Inaugural Arts Award

Joe Plaskett Foundation Award established by renowned painter

UVic visual arts master’s student Mark Neufeld is the first recipient of the inaugural Joe Plaskett Foundation Award, presented today in Vancouver. The $25,000 award is one of the largest in Canada and will be presented annually to a Canadian art student who has recently graduated with an MFA degree or is working towards this degree in the discipline of painting. It enables the recipient to spend a year furthering his or her education in Europe through travel and study. Neufeld plans to travel to Berlin, Germany.

Eighty-six year old Plaskett was born in New Westminster, B.C., and still produces still life, portraits, and interiors which are part of the public collections of galleries across the country. He has lived primarily in Europe since the 1950s. Plaskett, the recipient of the first Emily Carr scholarship in 1946, wishes to offer young Canadian painters the same opportunity the Carr award gave him in his youth. He was present at today’s ceremony at the Emily Carr Institute of Art + Design.

Neufeld, who also teaches at UVic, was born and raised in Ladner, B.C., and graduated from Emily Carr before coming to UVic in 2003 to complete his graduate degree. He describes his work as a combination of abstract and representational.

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