The Max Mara Art Prize for Women in collaboration with the Whitechapel Gallery is a biannual award established in 2005.

The aim of the Prize is to promote and support female artists based in the UK, enabling artists to develop their potential with the gift of time and space. The winner is awarded a six month Italian residency tailored to fit the artist and their winning proposal for the Prize. During the residency the artist has the opportunity to realise an ambitious new project which is presented in major solo exhibitions at the Whitechapel Gallery in London and Collezione Maramotti in Reggio Emilia, Italy.

THE WINNER

Interweaving women’s stories of loss and resilience with seventeenth century Baroque music by female composers, a new body of work from the seventh winner of the Max Mara Art Prize for Women Helen Cammock. The collection premiered at Whitechapel Gallery on June 24. Cammock presented a film, a series of vinyl cut prints and a screenprinted frieze exploring the idea of lament in women’s lives across histories and geographies.

Featuring interviews with the diverse women Cammock met on her travels including social activists, migrants, refugees, a member of a religious order, a Catholic nun and women who fought the dictatorship, the split-screen film at the heart of the exhibition memorialises the power of women’s voices from the Baroque period to Italy today.