Tito’s Prize
2024 Open Call

March 20 - May 6, 2024

 
 
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Austin Artists can now apply for the Tito’s Prize, a $15,000 award for one Austin-based artist, funded by a generous gift from Tito’s Handmade Vodka and facilitated by Big Medium. The award includes a solo exhibition during the spring in the Big Medium Gallery.

 
 
 

This annual opportunity is available to all artists within a 17-mile radius of Austin. Artists working in any artistic media and at any stage in their career are eligible.

The 2024 Curatorial Panel includes Dr. Anita Bateman, Associate Curator in the Department of Modern and Contemporary Art at MFAH The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Dr. Leigh A. Arnold, Nasher Curator, and Coka Treviño, Curator and Director of Programming at Big Medium. The three-member panel will unanimously select the prize-winning artist.

 
 

 
 

2024 Curators

Dr. Anita N. Bateman (she/her) is the Associate Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (MFAH), where she specializes in modern and contemporary African art and the art of the African diaspora. With over a decade of curatorial experience, she has collaborated on exhibitions, publications, and acquisitions that showcase the diversity and richness of primarily African diasporic artistic expressions and histories.

Bateman holds a Ph.D. in Art History and Visual Culture from Duke University, a Master’s in Art History from Duke University, and completed her undergraduate degree in Art History, graduating cum laude from Williams College. She has held curatorial positions at the RISD Museum, the Williams College Museum of Art, and the Nasher Museum of Art. Her academic research has been supported by the American Council of Learned Societies, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation, and the Social Science Research Council. Bateman was the Fall 2022 ARCAthens Curatorial Fellow and a 2022 Graham Foundation Grantee for the publication "Where is Africa" (Center for Art, Research, and Alliances), co-edited with Emanuel Admassu. Her research interests include the history of photography, Black feminism/womanism, and the role of social media in activism and liberation work. She is passionate about engaging with artists, collectors, and audiences to foster dialogue around art and culture.

Leigh Arnold is curator at the Nasher Sculpture Center and a scholar of Land art, Minimal, and Post-Minimal sculpture. In 2019, she curated Elmgreen & Dragset: Sculptures, the first major US museum exhibition of work by the artist duo, and The Four Fs: Family, Finance, Faith, and Friends by the French sound artist, Anne Le Troter, the artist’s first exhibition in North America and her first work in the English language. Starting in 2020, Arnold has collaborated with her Nasher colleagues to curate numerous solo presentations of works by North Texas-based artists as part of the Nasher Windows (2020) and Nasher Public series (2021-ongoing), including installations by Tamara Johnson, Leslie Martinez, Longhui Zhang, Ciara Elle Bryant, Karla Garcia, Vicki Meek, Shelby David Meier, Jer’Lisa Devezin, Christian Cruz, Liss LaFleur, Celia Eberle, Linnea Glatt, and Trey Burns. 

In 2022, Arnold curated Lynda Benglis, featuring new and recent work by the artist, as well as the exhibition Matthew Ronay: The Crack, the Swell, an Earth. Arnold’s exhibition, Groundswell: Women of Land Art, which focused on underrepresented women artists active in the historical Land Art movement, opened in the fall of 2023 and was accompanied by a scholarly publication that significantly revises the male-dominated narrative of the movement. She received her doctoral degree from the University of Texas at Dallas in 2016, where she wrote on Robert Smithson’s unfinished projects in Texas.

Coka Treviño is the Founder and Curator of The Projecto, an Austin-based organization fostering cultural connections between Latin America and the US. She is the Curator and Director of Programming at Big Medium, an Austin-based nonprofit art organization dedicated to advancing artists' careers. Additionally, she does Arts Programming at Soho House Austin. Her curatorial practice focuses on uplifting diverse artistic communities with an innovative and respectful approach to culture and contemporary social issues. Her work attempts to intertwine art, music, and social perspectives as often as possible, always with diversity, equity, and inclusion at the forefront of the projects.

Coka has worked with ArtPrize as a Curator and Outreach Specialist. She has co-curated events for the Blanton Museum and exhibitions for the Mexican American Cultural Center, the SXSW Art Program, and the Gallery at Austin’s Central Library. Previously, she supported the Exhibition department at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Monterrey, managed and curated exhibitions from the Universidad Autónoma de Nuevo León art collection in Monterrey, and served as a Curatorial Assistant for the Universal Forum of Cultures in Monterrey. She co-curated a concert with the Austin Symphony, highlighting women of color composers adding these pieces to the Symphony’s repertoire. She co-produced the project Translating Community History, a set of two books and hours of storytelling by Black and Latinx neighborhoods in Austin, which was recognized by the Preservation Merit Awards in 2023. The Mexican American Cultural Center co-sponsored and featured her Spanglish Series in 2020. She co-curated and managed Golden Hornet’s MXTX, a gender-balanced album, concert series, and open-source audio sample library to build cultural bridges between the US and Mexico.

 
 

Previous Tito’s Prize Recipients


 
 

About Tito's Handmade Vodka

Tito's Handmade Vodka is America's Original Craft Vodka. In 1997, Bert “Tito” Beveridge, now a 50–something geophysicist, obtained the first legal permit to distill in Texas and created Tito's Handmade Vodka. Tito distills his corn-based vodka using old–fashioned copper pot stills and the vodka is naturally gluten–free. Tito's Handmade Vodka has won the prestigious Double Gold Unanimous Judge's Choice at the San Francisco World Spirits Competition, besting 72 of the world's premier vodka brands. Tito's continues to receive critical acclaim for its impeccably pure taste, affordability and brand growth. Tito's Handmade Vodka is distilled and bottled by Fifth Generation Inc. in Austin, Texas, and is available in Liter, 1.75L, 750ml, 375ml, 200ml and 50ml sizes.