Art at any Prize

In 1899, Switzerland invented a curious idea. Faced with what officials called a "rather modest" national painting scene, the Confederation decided to invest in talent as if it were industry. The newly created Federal Art Scholarships sent young Swiss artists to Munich, Paris, and Florence to learn from the best.

It was a bold move: soft power before the term existed. Art, like watchmaking or chocolate, became a matter of national identity, a symbol to export. The state would fund its artists, shape their education, and in doing so, help define how Switzerland appeared to the world.

From that decision would spring a global phenomenon: art as diplomacy, prizes as policy. Over the next century, awards, grants, and residencies multiplied endlessly. They still serve the same dual purpose: to support creation and to project prestige.

But the origin of this logic lies elsewhere.

In the 17th century, mirror-making was Venice's state secret. To build his Hall of Mirrors, Louis XIV had to break the monopoly, stealing Venetian artisans to create the Royal Glassworks of France. From that act of espionage was born an idea: craftsmanship as sovereignty. Jean-Baptiste Colbert, the Sun King's minister, expanded it further, turning artistic excellence into an arm of state power.

He created the Prix de Rome in 1663, sending young painters and sculptors to the Eternal City to study antiquity and bring glory home. The works they produced filled royal palaces. The message was clear: art makes nations visible.

That belief carried through centuries, morphing into the architecture of modern cultural policy, culminating in the grand 19th-century invention of the art prize. Venice institutionalized it in 1895 with the "Prima Esposizione Internazionale d’Arte della Città di Venezia," soon to become the Biennale. Art would now compete like sport, with gold medals, juries, and scandals.

By the late 20th century, competition became spectacle. The Turner Prize, launched in 1984, turned outrage into marketing. Tracey Emin's "My Bed," her sheets tangled, her life laid bare, lost to Steve McQueen's film, but it won the public imagination. The prize created not just winners but myths, broadcast live by Channel 4, feeding the Young British Artists into global consciousness.

Every nation learned the lesson. Switzerland formalized its own with the Swiss Art Awards in Basel. France followed suit with the Marcel Duchamp Prize in 2000, collectors stepping in where the state had grown cautious, hoping to restore France's cultural shine abroad. Prizes like these are no longer just recognition; they are statements of survival, proof that a culture is still capable of producing relevance.

Private sponsorship reshaped the landscape. Pernod Ricard, BOSS, Pommery, Moleskine, JPMorgan, luxury and finance joined the art world in a pas de deux of prestige. For every oil company withdrawing from art partnerships under public pressure, a champagne house or fashion label takes its place, offering legitimacy wrapped in branding.

In this ecosystem, the art prize has become a mirror of its time: elastic, mobile, opportunistic. Less about permanence, more about influence.

Which is where MAZE comes in.

The MAZE/Art Awards F.P. Journe do not belong to one fair or one format. They move, shifting location, focus, and scope each year. One edition honors a booth at MIRA Art Fair Paris, celebrating Latin American creation; another might appear at Loop in Barcelona, or TEFAF in Maastricht, or JOYA in Monaco. Each collaboration redefines the purpose of the prize, adapting to context, theme, and geography.

Where traditional awards consecrate stability, MAZE cultivates fluidity. It recognizes that prestige today is not about hierarchy but about connection, the ability to move between worlds, to reframe the rules without breaking them.

A work from the winning gallery at MIRA is acquired for the Reina Sofía in Madrid. The gesture closes the loop between fair, institution, and artist, but with a different logic: not the state crowning its chosen one, but a constellation of independent forces aligning for a moment.

Perhaps that is what the art prize has always chased: visibility, validation, eternity. MAZE suggests another value: circulation. Not a medal on a chest, but a pulse through a network. "Art at any prize," yes, but only when it moves.

‍

///

‍

Emmanuel Grandjean is an art and design critic based in Geneva and has served for eight years as the Swiss correspondent for the French edition of The Art Newspaper.

‍