Artes Mundi 2012

The Welsh dragon is determined to outcrap the English rose when it comes to making a mockery of the concept of art. The Artes Mundi is the richest contemporary art prize in the UK, with £40,000 as its top award and £4,000 going to each of the runners up. This year the Artes Mundi was won by a Mexican woman, Teresa Margolles, who graduated in forensic medicine and who obviously knows nothing about art. Shown is her Plancha (2012), a series of hotplates onto which drips water that has been used to clean dead bodies in a morgue. Whether this contaminated water was imported into Wales in barrels or there is a morgue on an upper floor of the National Museum of Wales in Cardiff I can't say, as the organisers are keeping shtoom on the subject (CLICK). To view tripe by the seven shortlisted "artists" CLICK.