The ANNUAL is one of the oldest and most prestigious competitions in the United States. Open to local, national and international artists, The Print Center is particularly interested in highlighting the use of photography and/or printmaking in new and intriguing ways, both in content and process.

Jurors 

Dr. Makeda Best is the Richard L. Menschel Curator of Photography and Interim Head, Division of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Harvard Art Museums.

Curlee Raven Holton is the Executive Director of the David C. Driskell Center at the University of Maryland and The David M. and Linda Roth Professor of Art, emeritus, at Lafayette College, Easton, PA where he founded the Experimental Printmaking Institute.

Congratulations to the 25 Semifinalists and 10 Finalists!

Watch previous award winners discuss
their experiences with the ANNUAL:

Dr. Makeda Best is the Richard L. Menschel Curator of Photography at the Harvard Art Museums, Cambridge, MA. Her scholarly interests focus on 19th and 20th century American photography, with a special interest in photojournalism, documentary, war photography and text and image works. Recent exhibitions include Crossing Lines, Constructing Home: Displacement and Belonging in Contemporary Art and Winslow Homer: Eyewitness and Time is Now: Photography and Social Change in James Baldwin’s America. Her book Elevate the Masses: Alexander Gardner, Photography and Democracy was published in 2020 by the Pennsylvania State University Press. The subject of her current book project is American landscape photography. Best holds a BA from Barnard College, New York, a BFA and an MA from California Institute of the Arts, Santa Clarita, and an MA and PhD from Harvard University.

Curlee Raven Holton has been the Executive Director of the David C. Driskell Center at the University of Maryland, College Park since 2012. He was the founding director of the Experimental Printmaking Institute at Lafayette College, Easton, PA, and is the founder and current director of Raven Fine Art Editions, Easton. Holton is also The David M. and Linda Roth Professor of Art, emeritus, at Lafayette College. As a printmaker and painter, his work has been exhibited professionally for over 25 years in more than 31 solo shows and over 80 group shows. His exhibitions include prestigious national and international venues such as Egypt’s 7th International Biennale, the Cleveland Museum of Art, OH and the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York. His work is held in many private and public collections including the Cleveland Museum of Art, OH; Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, CT; Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, PA; and The Library of Congress and National Gallery of Art, both Washington, D.C. As part of his research and study as an artist-scholar, he has lectured and presented demonstrations throughout the United States and abroad in Costa Rica, Europe, Mexico and the West Indies. He has presented over 70 public lectures on his work, African American art and contemporary printmaking. He has been published in numerous catalogs and journals. Holton earned a BFA from the Cleveland Institute of Fine Arts, OH and an MFA from Kent State University, OH. He began teaching Printmaking and African American Art History in 1991 at Lafayette College.

We asked our jurors four questions. Watch their interviews above, or, read the interviews here!

Click here for more information about The Print Center's ANNUAL International Competition and its history.