New Contemporaries

New Contemporaries is an organisation that works to support emerging artists at the beginning of their careers by introducing them to the visual arts sector and to the public through a variety of platforms, including an annual exhibition. Artists, whether still studying or having recently graduated, are given opportunities to make contacts and gain professional experience outside of their educational institutions. For the annual exhibition, artists are invited to submit a portfolio of work, from which a selection is made by a panel of judges. The selection is made by artists and writers, and often the selector will have previously been exhibited in a New Contemporaries show. Founded in 1949 as the 'Young Contemporaries', the exhibition has run annually as a means to provide an impartial and democratic stepping stone from arts education to the professional art sector. Established hierarchies that might otherwise become set within the art school system are able to be assessed without bias through the anonymous selection process. Selectors have in the past included Ryan Gander (2013), Rosalind Nashashibi (2012), Pablo Bronstein (2011), Michael Landy (2007), Angus Fairhurst (2006), Jane and Louise Wilson (2005), Tacita Dean (2004), Rebecca Warren (2003), Sarah Lucas (2002), Chris Ofili (2001), Gavin Turk (2000) and Susan Hiller (1999).

An annual exhibition for the final selection of New Contemporaries is staged in a leading UK arts venue; New Contemporaries has exhibited as part of the Liverpool Biennial since its launch in 1999. The importance of regional impartiality is recognised in the anonymity of the contributor's school, age, and nationality during the selection process and by the annual exhibition having no fixed location. A catalogue is printed to accompany the exhibition each year.

The first annual exhibition, initiated by Carel Weight for the British Society of Artists Galleries, was established in 1949 and known as 'Young Contemporaries'. In the foreword to the 1949 exhibition catalogue, Philip Hendy, then Director of the National Gallery, wrote of his "hope that it is only the first of many. That it may grown into an annual event." The early exhibition gathered much critical and audience attention. Howard Hodgkin recollected that “the most memorable event at the opening of the first show was the speech made by Philip Hendy. With extraordinary generosity and frankness and somehow with a lot of sympathy as well, he compared what he felt to be the bleak but possible heroic fate awaiting us when we left Art School to the cosy, hierarchical life of an Art Historian.”

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