Selectors 1989 - 1990

Iwona Blazwick OBE (b. 1955) is an art critic and lecturer, and has been Director of the Whitechapel Art Gallery in London since 2001. She discovered Damien Hirst and staged his first solo show at a public London art gallery, Institute of Contemporary Arts in 1992. She supports the careers of young artists. Blazwick is said to be one of the most important woman in British art and was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for services to art in 2008.

Photo: The Whitechapel Gallery director Iwona Blazwick Photo: Rick Pushinsky

Jon Thompson (b. 1936) became Head of the Department of Art at Goldsmiths in the late 1970s, and is credited with opening up specialisms - allowing students to work freely between different media. He also introduced mixed year groups in the studios, which created a radically new kind of pedagogical experience for tutors and students alike.

By the late 1980s under Thompson’s leadership, Goldsmiths had become the art programme of choice for an ambitious and radical new generation of artists. Many of these were involved in Damien Hirst’s legendary Freeze warehouse exhibition in 1988, and came to be associated with the so-called YBA movement.

Nicholas Logsdail OBE (b.1945) is a British art dealer, the owner of the Lisson Gallery, a contemporary art gallery on Bell Street, Lisson Grove, London, founded by Logsdail and Fiona Hildyard in 1967.

Logsdail was educated at Bryanston School and the Slade School of Fine Art. In 2014, The Guardian named him in their "Movers and makers: the most powerful people in the art world".

Logsdail was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2017 New Year Honours for services to the arts.

Photo: Michal Chelbin

Richard Wilson (b. 1953) is one of Britain’s most renowned sculptors. He is internationally celebrated for his interventions in architectural space which draw heavily for their inspiration from the worlds of engineering and construction.

Wilson has exhibited widely nationally and internationally for over 35 years. Wilson has also represented Britain in the Sydney, Sao Paulo, Venice Aperto Biennials and Yokohama and Aichi Triennals.

Wilson was nominated for the Turner Prize on two occasions and was awarded the prestigious DAAD residency in Berlin 1992/3.

Photo: Eddie Mulholland

Sacha Craddock is an independent art critic, writer & curator based in London. She studied painting at Central Saint Martins followed by a post-graduate painting degree at Chelsea School of Art before going on to write criticism for The Guardian and The Times. She has been Chair of the Board of New Contemporaries and selection process since 1996. Craddock co-founded Artschool Palestine and is co-founder and member of Faculty at British School at Rome, Trustee of the Shelagh Cluett Trust, Trustee of the Art House Foundation and Executive Committee Member of the International Association of Art Critics AICA.

Craddock has judged many art prizes, such as the Turner Prize in 1999 and the John Moores Painting Prize in 2008.

Veronica Ryan (b. 1956) is a Montserrat-born British artist. She has studied at St Albans, Bath Academy of Art, the Slade School of Art and the School for Oriental and African Studies. Ryan completed a residence at Tate St Ives from 1998 to 2000, where she worked in the former studio of Barbara Hepworth.

Ryan was awarded the Cleveland International Drawing Biennale in 1983, and a Henry Moore Foundation Award in 1988. She was represented in the Tate's show 'Sculptors and Modellers' and at solo exhibitions at the Institute of Contemporary Arts (1987) and Kettle's Yard (1988). Her work is in the permanent collection of the Tate Gallery.

Photo: Andy Feldman